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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 

























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































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MY WONDERFUL VISIT 














































































































































































































































































THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS. 

Two Copies Receivec 


OCT 0 1903 



Copyright, 1903, by 
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 


Published, September, 1903 


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CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 


I. 

In 

Which 

I Go and Get There . . 

i 

II. 

In 

Which 

I Am “ Personally Con- 




ducted 


13 

III. 

In 

Which 

1 See a New Kind of Fog 

27 

IV. 

In 

Which We Begin With War and 

End With Peas 

37 

V. 

In Which, 

Finally, I Reach the Woods 

52 

VI. 

In 

Which 

Home 

Molly and the Boys Come 

63 

VII. 

In 

Which 

We Get Into Trouble . . 

7 1 

VIII. 

In Which I Am Stung By a Duck-Pond 

Bee 

85 

IX. 

In 

Which 

We Go For the Cow . 

98 

X. 

In 

Which 

We Go Into Camp . 

108 

XI. 

In 

Which 

We Inspect Treasures . 

123 

XII. 

In 

Which 

We Go After Flag-Root . 

I 3 I 

XIII. 

In 

Which 

We Make a Raid . . . 

142 


V 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

XIV. In Which I Represent Nations . 148 
XV. In Which Dick and I Go Driving . 162 
XVI. In Which I Listen To the Hoodoo- 


Bird 176 

XVII. In Which I Go To a Very Nice 

School 183 

XVIII. In Which I Remember the Sassafras 

Lozenges 197 

XIX. In Which We Go Upon the Trail 206 

XX. In Which We Have a “ Tip-Top ” 

Time 223 

XXL In Which Lightning Gets Into Dick 245 

XXII. In Which I Exit 258 


vi 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


Lucy ...... Frontispiece 

FACING 

PAGE 

To be following that tinkling bell through the 
moonlight, amid dewiness and sweet wild 
odors . . . . . . .104 

Over there is a lady, she has green garments . 136 

I listened, listened, listened, until every nerve in 

me seemed to be saying, w Hark ! hark ! ” . 180 

The banks were so overgrown with bushes that 

we had to walk in the water part of the way . 220 











CHAPTER I 

IN WHICH I GO AND GET THERE 

W HEN I was a little girl, eight years old 5 
I made an enchanting, never-to-be-for- 
gotten visit. It was a visit to Cousin Sally's 
farm, and it lasted only a week, but it was full of 
wonders and doings and happenings. 

I knew that it would be, even before I went, 
for I had never been into the country, the real, 
Simon-pure country, although I had often taken 
long walks with my grandfather to the fields and 
woods outside the town, and the Country was in 
my fancy second only to Fairyland. 

My mother asked Mr. Crowe, the milkman, 
who brought us milk twice a week, and whose 
way led by Cousin Sally's place, to carry me out 
there ; and one warm July morning she got me 
ready to go. I felt excited and delighted; my 


i 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


heart went hop-skip, and my mind was in such a 
stir — as if my wits were feathers, dancing every 
which way — that all the morning I ha-rdly knew 
what I or anybody else was about. But I kept 
quiet ; I was what is called “ a quiet child.” 

When Mr. Crowe came I kissed everyone, and 
went and climbed into the wagon ; but I had to 
wait there a long time, while Mr. Crowe told my 
grandmother what the news was out his way and 
talked politics with my grandfather. 

In the meantime, my mother brought a valise 
to put under the wagon seat. The lock of it was 
broken, and she had tied it together at the handles 
with an old shoestring ; it was not quite shut, and 
my pink-and-white dress was showing. 

“ Be sure that you shake out your dresses as 
soon as you get there ; the bag is so full that 
they will be all wrinkles if you don't,” she said. 
“And ask Cousin Sally to let me know if she de- 
cides to keep you over a week, for, if you stay, 
I must send some more clothes. Now, be a 
good girl, and mind Aunt Eunice and Cousin 
Sally.” 

I said, “ Yes’m,” and reached down to kiss her 
again. 

Then my grandmother came to the woodshed 
door, and told my mother that I ought to have a 


2 


I GO AND GET THERE 


sunshade. “ She’ll get sunstruck, in this broiling 
heat,” she said. 

“ She couldn’t hold it,” my mother returned. 
“ She will have to use both hands to hold on 
with whenever the wagon jolts. I guess she will 
do well enough ; her hat-brim is broad, and she is 
used to being in the sun.” 

Just then, Cap’n Weeks, who sat reading the 
newspaper at his front window on the opposite 
side of the street, put his head out and asked : 
“ Why, where’s Lucy going to ? ” and he was so 
hard of hearing, that when I answered : <c Out to 
Kittie Reed’s, to make a visit,” he did not under- 
stand. “ How ? ” said he, shielding his ear with 
his hand. 

“ Out to Eunice’s,” my grandmother told him, 
as loud as she could call ; but he did not under- 
stand her either. 

“ How ? ” he said again. 

Then, my grandfather, who was coming through 
the woodshed with Mr. Crowe, lifted a hurricane 
voice : 

“ She’s going out to Eunice’s to make a visit. 
Out to Sally Reed’s place, to make a visit. Out — 
to — Sally — Reed’s !” 

“ Oh — oh ! ” said Cap’n Weeks, nodding sat- 
isfaction. “ Wal, be a good little gal, Lucy.” 

3 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


All the children that happened to be playing 
near gathered around to see me off. They stood 
on the edge of the sidewalk, and looked and 
looked and looked with wide, serious eyes, but 
did not say anything. I don’t know whether the 
difference was in their feelings or mine, but, al- 
though they were my playmates, all at once it 
seemed as if they were strangers ; their curious, 
sober, speechless staring made me shy. I tried 
to smile and be at ease, but I wished that Mr. 
Crowe would stop talking politics and get ready 
to go. 

By and by he did ; and then suddenly a big 
lump came in my throat, and I felt as if 1 wanted 
to get right out of the wagon and stay at home 
with mother and grandma and grandpa and lit- 
tle Bob. But I sat still and tried to smile again 
as I bade a last good-by. 

Grandpa came and kissed me and put a roll of 
sassafras lozenges into my hand. “ Have a good 
time,” he said, “ and be a good girl.” 

“ Yes, you be a good girl,” grandma called. 

“ G’lang,” said Mr. Crowe to the horse, and 
the horse walked leisurely away. 

The Middle Street Guards, a regiment of 
youngsters, to which Bobby belonged, were just 
marching out of the Bibber boys’ yard, and they 


4 


I GO AND GET THERE 


fell in behind us, drumming and tooting. Bobby 
was one of the tooters. They had little tin horns 
that did not give very much sound, and their 
drum was a very small one, but they managed to 
make considerable noise (you know what boys 
are), and they kicked up a great dust as they 
tramped. All the children on the sidewalk kept 
apace with them. 

Before the horse had taken a dozen steps, 
Liddy Ellen Tucker came along. Liddy Ellen 
was an old lady, of about my grandmother’s age, 
who lived next door to us. She was a special friend 
of mine and knew where I was going. She was 
coming home from market, and had a basket on 
her arm. 

££ Hello, Lucy, you off? ” she cried, cheerily. 
££ I hope you’ll have a real nice time. Remem- 
ber me to Aunt Eunice. And be a good girl, 
Lucy.” 

££ Yes’m,” I replied. And then I was hailed 
from the other side of the street by Celia Tate. 
Celia was a young lady, another particular friend 
of mine. She was sweeping the sidewalk in front 
of her home. She wore a pink sweeping-cap 
above her pretty face. 

“ O Lucy, what a warm day for a ride ! ” she 
cried. ££ Hope you’ll have a lovely time, and 
5 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


drink lots of milk, and get real fat. Good-by ! 
Be a good girl, Lucy ! Ta, ta ! ” And she gayly 
waved her hand. 

Then we came to the corner, and the Middle 
Street Guards marched up India Street. As they 
went they gave three cheers, a toot, and a roll of 
the drum, and every one of them shouted: “Good- 
by ! Be a good girl, Lucy ! ” I could hear 
Bobby's loud and lisping voice above the others, 
and although I felt provoked and embarrassed, I 
waved my hand to him ; but when all those chil- 
dren who had stared at me in that dumb yet spell- 
ful way found their tongues and screamed after 
me, “ Good-by ! Be a good girl, Lucy ! ” my 
temper shot up in a blaze, and I turned my 
back. 

“ Clang,” said Mr. Crowe to the horse. Then 
he looked gravely down at me. “ I expect you’re 
a pretty hard character,” said he, with a slow 
shake of the head. 

He looked so serious that I did not know he 
was joking. It gave me a sinking feeling in the 
breast. 

“ They just say that. They don’t mean that 
they think I’ll be naughty,” I said with solemn 
earnestness ; but Mr. Crowe’s only response was 
another doubting head-shake. He chirruped to 
6 


I GO AND GET THERE 


the horse, and away we went, with a rattle of tin 
cans behind us. 

It was not pleasant to be riding with a person 
who had such a bad opinion of me, but there were 
so many interesting things to look at that I for- 
got to be unhappy. At first I did not mind the 
heat at all, for after we went from under the arch- 
ing elm trees on Middle Street we drove along 
behind a sprinkling-cart with its refreshing squirt 
of water, which, by simply closing my eyes to a 
mere crack that shut out everything else, I could 
fancy into a fountain ; and when we turned down 
Market Street we found ourselves behind a drip- 
ping ice-cart, piled high with great, glittering 
blocks, that made a miniature iceberg. Then we 
came to the Market, where Mr. Crowe had an 
errand to do. 

“ You set here, Sissy. I sha’n’t be gone long,” 
he said ; but he was gone long, a long, long time. 
It seemed hours to me, sitting there in the hot 
sunshine, and I grew very tired ; for the wagon 
seat was high, hard, and slippery, there was no 
back to it for me to lean against, and I was so 
little that my feet did not reach the floor. 

I enjoyed the novelty of looking down on the 
rows of meat and vegetables, for always before I 
had had to look up from the sidewalk to see 
7 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


them ; and it was enlivening to watch the people 
and the teams moving about. I counted the va- 
rious kinds of vegetables — beans, peas, lettuce, 
cucumbers, potatoes, onions, and all the rest ; then 
I counted the horses, the white ones and the dark 
ones, those that were moving and those that were 
standing still ; then I chose what I would have 
for dinner if 1 were going to have a great dinner, 
say a Fourth of July one, with a lot of company 
to dine ; then I looked at the faces of the people 
and considered which of them I would choose to 
know, supposing that I had to know some of 
them ; and then I thought about my visit, and 
wondered and dreamed. I wondered if Kitty, 
Rosalie, and I would do any of the things that the 
children in the Rollo and Lucy books did. I 
hoped there would be a brook with stepping- 
stones, mossy under the water and smooth above. 
We would go over them in our bare feet, and dip 
our toes in the cool water. And the woods would 
be cool and dim, and — -just then Mr. Crowe came 
back. 

“ You all tuckered out, Sissy ? ” he said, as he 
climbed in and gave the reins a shake. “ I stayed 
longer than I meant to ; I got interested talk- 
ing with a man over there, that thinks different 
from what I do. We’ll go right along now.” 

8 


I GO AND GET THERE 


“How far is it out to Cousin Sally's? ” I asked. 

“ Seven mile/' Mr. Crowe answered ; and that 
was the last time either of us spoke until we came 
to the end of my journey. 

As we went through the city I looked at the 
store windows, at people and teams, at the flower 
gardens and the trees ; and sometimes I wanted to 
tell Mr. Crowe that such or such a person lived in 
this or that house, but he looked as if he had for- 
gotten all about me, so I did not like to. When 
we came to Deering bridge the tide was in, and 
some boys were fishing from a punt down below. 
I wanted to ask Mr. Crowe what kind of fish 
they were catching, but I did not. Then I looked 
over into Deering’s Oaks, and remembered that 
Grandpa and I went there nutting last fall, and I 
came near telling Mr. Crowe what a famous place 
it was for acorns ; but I did not. I was not sure 
that he would care about it. Besides, I knew that 
he believed me to be a very bad girl ; I thought 
perhaps that was the reason he would not talk to 
me, and it took away my courage. 

We drove through Deering and out into the 
country. It was an endless panorama of fields 
and straggling farm-houses, with woods for a back- 
ground. In many of the fields men were at work 
raking and loading hay, and we passed several 
9 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


piled-up hay-racks on the road. The air was quiv- 
ery with heat, and full of butterflies, yellow, brown, 
and white, dizzily hovering and fluttering. There 
were no clouds in the sky. The dust rose under 
our wheels. The milk-cans jingle-jangled all the 
time. And oh, how the grasshoppers shrilled ! 
I thought that noise was their voices, and said to 
myself, “ I guess they'll have sore throats by 
night ; ” and the idea so tickled me that I laughed 
out loud. Then I gave a shy, sidelong glance at 
Mr. Crowe, and found him looking in pretty 
much the same way at me ; then we both quickly 
looked away ; and so we rode on in silence. 

By and by we came to another bridge, over a 
beautiful river, where the trees on the banks 
leaned to the clear water till they could see them- 
selves. It was the river at Riverton, and although 
in those days there was no park there, the river 
was the same as now. I had never seen a river be- 
fore, and I so far forgot my awe of Mr. Crowe as 
to twist about on the seat and seize his coat-sleeve 
to steady myself while I gazed down at the green 
and sky-blue reflections. He helped me with one 
hand, but neither of us spoke. 

We passed a school-house, more houses, fields, 
and orchards, and then entered a woodland road. 
I had never seen a road like that before — with 
io 


I GO AND GET THERE 


woods on both sides of it. It was like the roads 
that you read about in fairy tales, leading through 
enchanted forests to enchanted castles. Tall 
evergreens stood there, and other kinds of trees, 
too, the kind that look green only in spring and 
summer — “ summer-greens ” I used to call them. 
There were trees, trees, reaching ahead as far as 
you could see. On either side you could see 
under them, away into the mysteriousness of the 
wood. Along the edge grew brambles, weeds, and 
ferns. Shadows danced on the white, sandy road. 

There was a long stretch of this wonderful 
road ; and through it all I forgot that I was tired 
and warm, but kept looking, first on one side, 
then on the other, then ahead to where the trees 
seemed to meet, then up to the lofty tree-tops, 
then down to the white road with its wheel-ruts 
and ribbon-lines of grass. 

All at once the wood on the left ended, and 
there was a pasture with a stone wall bounding 
it ; and beyond the pasture was a large vegetable 
garden ; and beyond the garden was a house, a 
white house, with a piazza and green blinds, and 
with a barn beside it. 

Then Mr. Crowe broke silence. 

“ Do you know who lives there ? ” he asked, 
with a sort of smile. 


ii 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“No, sir/’ I answered, faintly., 

“ That’s the place,” he assured me. 

“ I don’t see anybody,” I said, feeling sud- 
denly disheartened. I had not really thought 
about it, but unconsciously I had half expected 
to see all the family at the door to welcome me. 
At least, I had looked to see Kitty and Rosalie. 

“ They know you’re coming ; I guess they’ll 
see you in a minute,” he replied. 

We drove up to the big gate. There were 
two gates, side by side, a little one for people and 
a big one for teams, and the big one was open. 
A tall pine-tree stood by the entrance, and threw 
its shadow across the road. It was now early in 
the afternoon. 

Mr. Crowe stopped in the shadow, stepped 
down, lifted me out, and put my valise beside 
me. I was so tired that for a minute I could 
hardly stand, and when a great dog, who was lying 
on the piazza, rose and gazed at me I was fright- 
ened too. But I did not tell Mr. Crowe how I 
felt, and I did not try to lift my valise while he 
could see me. I stood still at the gate, waiting 
for him to drive away. 

“ Good-by,” I said. 

“ Good-by,” said Mr. Crowe. 


12 



CHAPTER II 

IN WHICH I AM “PERSONALLY CONDUCTED” 

1 WATCHED him out of sight. It seemed 
queer to me that a minute ago I had been 
sitting in that wagon, riding along, and wonder- 
ing when I should get — here, where I was now. 
And then it seemed strange that I was here, here> 
standing alone at a gate, far away from home and 
all my folks. I cannot tell you how strange I 
felt, as if I were not quite real, but a person in a 
story, having things happen to me and not 
knowing what the story would have me do next. 
I cannot tell you, either, how lonesome and timid 
I felt, and how little, how very, very little. You 
see, I had never been away from home before — 
at least, not alone. Just imagine how you would 
feel to be far away from your mother, standing 
alone in a road, with no one in sight but a dog 
that looked as big as an ox. 

The big dog did not bark, but stood on the 
piazza and gazed at me, like the monstrous beasts 
13 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


that guard the enchanted castles. I was afraid 
of him. I stood still, considering what to do. 
It came to me, that, in fairy tales, if you do not 
show your fear, but walk straight by the terrible 
beasts and dragons, they do not harm you, and 
the enchanted castle doors spring open to let you 
in. I was not a brave little girl, but because there 
did not seem to be anything else for me to do, I 
resolved to try to do it. So I lifted my valise, 
which was heavy for me, and staggered along. 
Then the big dog gave one deep-toned bark, and 
I stopped, trembling. Then another, smaller dog’s 
voice took up the challenge, and the next minute 
Rosalie came running out of the door and down 
the piazza steps, and at her heels ran Prince, 
her black-and-tan, while the big fellow slowly 
followed. 

Rosalie came so fast that her long brown curls 
blew out behind her. She was very glad to see 
me ; she flung her arms around my neck and 
kissed me. Then she laid hold of my valise. 
“ I’ll take it,” she said ; “ let me have it.” 

“ No, no,” I returned ; “ it’s too heavy.” But 
Rosalie, although two years younger than I, and 
shorter, was sturdier ; besides, she was not tired. 
So she tugged the bag along with very little help 
from me. 




I AM “ PERSONALLY CONDUCTED 


Prince began to caper about me and leap up 
against my shoulder, wagging his tail and barking 
joyously. He recognized me as an old acquaint- 
ance, for he had sometimes been to town with 
Cousin Sally. The big dog walked up and 
smelled of me. I was afraid, but I tried not to 
show it. I put my hand out to pat his head, but 
when his cold nose touched it I thought that he 
was going to bite, and drew it back with a shudder. 

“ He won't hurt you," said Rosalie. “Rover’s 
a good dog. Aren’t you, Rover? He’s only 
trying to get acquainted.’’ 

Rover walked ahead in a dignified way, as if to 
say : “ I won’t trouble you. You are very fool- 
ish to be afraid of me.’’ He was a hound, black 
with a tan breast. He was sleek, and his long 
ears were silky soft. There was a large sore 
place on his back, half healed, and livid-looking. 

“ What made his back like that ? ’’ I asked. 

“He was scalded. A dreadful wicked woman 
did it on purpose, because he went to her house, 
and she doesn’t like dogs. Mother put things on 
it, to take the burn out. He isn’t our dog, but 
he stays with us all the time now. Lucy, we 
didn’t think you’d get here so soon. Kitty and I 
were going to run down to the gate when we 
heard the wagon, but we didn’t hear it. 

15 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Kitty ! Kitty ! ” she called. “ Here’s Lucy ! ” 

Then she added : “ Kitty’s tooth aches. That’s 
why she didn’t go to school. Down, Prince, 
down ! You’ve kissed Lucy enough.” 

We went by the front door, to the piazza, which 
led to the back one. On it were a lot of house 
plants, taking their summer outing. The yard 
was full of cunning little downy chickens, running, 
pecking, and peep-peeping ; while several mother 
hens confined in tent-like coops thrust their heads 
between the slats and called : “ Cluck, cluck, 
cluck! ” to their straying babies. The barn-door 
was open, and I saw a swing hanging there. 

Kitty came to the door just as we reached it. 
She had a handkerchief tied about her face, tooth- 
ache fashion. Her eyes were red, as if she had 
been crying. She kissed me and took the valise. 
Then we went, all of us excepting Rover, into the 
kitchen, where more kisses awaited me, from 
Aunt Eunice and Cousin Sally, and they asked 
me questions upon questions about the folks at 
home. 

Now, I suppose I ought to tell you who Aunt 
Eunice and the others were, and some particulars 
about them. Aunt Eunice was my grandmother’s 
sister. She was a slender old lady, with a pleasant 
face, and a quiet way of talking and moving about. 

16 


I AM “PERSONALLY CONDUCTED 


Cousin Sally was her daughter. She was a very 
lively person when she was in good spirits, but 
was apt to be melancholy and fretty when things 
went wrong. She had four children, Molly, Bert, 
Kitty, and Rosalie. Molly was sixteen years old, 
very pretty and good-natured, and always full of 
fun. Bert was fifteen. He was quieter than 
Molly, but liked to have a good time as well as 
she did. Molly and Bert were working in the 
Corn-shop this summer. The Corn-shop was 
two miles down the road, beside the river, near, if 
not just where the Riverton Casino is now. They 
used to go to work at six o’clock in the morning, 
and leave the shop at six in the afternoon. Of 
course it was then too early in the season for corn, 
so they must have been putting up something else 
— green peas, perhaps ; I never thought, till this 
moment, to wonder about it, but I know that they 
worked there, putting up something. 

Kitty was twelve years old, and went to school. 
Rosalie, also, went to school, on pleasant days, 
when she felt like it ; but she had not yet begun 
to attend regularly. 

Kitty’s toothache got magically better while her 
mother and grandmother were asking their ques- 
tions, and when they had done she proposed 
showing me over the place. 

i7 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ We’ll go through the barn first,” she said, 
“ and come round by way of the orchard and the 
garden.” 

“ You keep out of the garden,” said Cousin 
Sally. “ I don’t want three children traipsing 
over my garden.” 

“ But I want Lucy to see how nice it looks,” 
said Kitty. 

“ She can see well enough from the orchard,” 
Cousin Sally replied. “ Don’t you go into the 
garden. You mind, now.” 

First we stopped to look at the chickens. There 
were several broods of them. Some were like 
tiny, fluffy balls of yellow and white, and one 
family were older, larger, and longer-legged. How 
they did run around, picking in the gravel, and 
crying : “ Peep, peep, peep ! ” And every minute 
or two some mother hen in one of the coops 
would call her own little flock, and they would go 
skurrying to her to get the tidbit that she was 
clucking about. 

There were two dishes on the ground in front of 
the piazza, one of food and one of water. One 
of the bigger chickens tried to push his way up to 
the water while a number of little ones were 
drinking, and crowded a baby chick into the 
dish ; but Kitty rescued the unfortunate, wiped 
18 


I AM “PERSONALLY CONDUCTED 


it with her apron, cuddled it in her hands, and 
breathed on its down till it was dry again. She 
put one of the soft, live little things into my 
hands, too, but it acted so frightened that I was 
glad to let it go. I wanted to stay and watch 
them, but Kitty said no, there was too much to 
be seen ; so on we went. 

We went into the barn. The front part of it 
was a carriage-house, and the buggy was there. 
There were pieces of harness hanging on the 
walls, also tools of various kinds and a lantern. 
The floor was clean excepting for hens' feathers 
and wisps of hay; but there were a good many 
cobwebs up aloft. A swing hung from the 
beams, and I wanted to stay and swing, but 
Kitty said no, we would swing after I had seen 
the place. 

In the back part of the barn were the stalls for 
Charlie, the horse, and Fannie, the cow, but 
neither of them was there. Overhead was the 
hayloft, nearly full of new hay. 

Out in the barnyard was the pig-pen. Rosalie 
stirred the pig up with a stick, to make him 
grunt ; but I did not like pigs, so we went to see 
the hens, and Rosalie threw corn at the old 
rooster until he charged at us. The henyard 
fence was between us and him, but we sprang 
19 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


back, half frightened, and laughing, and Prince 
began to bark (as Kitty said), with all his barkum. 

Then the old rooster stretched his neck, shook 
his tail-feathers, spread himself, and crowed de- 
fiantly, and some young roosters crowed, too, 
and the hens took up the battle-cry, and you 
would have thought Pandemonium was loose ; 
until suddenly Rover lifted his voice in one long, 
deep bark, as much as to say : “ There, there, 
that will do ! ” and all the hubbub stopped at once. 

I was astonished. 

“ Do you suppose they understood him ? ” I 
asked Kitty. 

“ Of course. All animals understand each 
other/’ said Kitty. 

“ Yes,” I said, “ I know they do ; I’ve heard 
them at it, but I never knew it with my own ears 
before. If animals can understand each other 
and people too, why can’t people understand 
them, I wonder ? ” 

“ Some people can,” Kitty replied. “There 
were some Indians camping out down here in the 
woods last year. That Indian man could under- 
stand what animals said. Birds would perch on 
his shoulder and hand, and talk to him, and he 
would talk back to them, and they understood 
him — birds and squirrels and chipmunks.” 


20 


I AM “PERSONALLY CONDUCTED 


“In fairy stories, the way anyone gets to un- 
derstand birds is to eat a bird’s heart,” I in- 
formed them. “ If you want to understand ani- 
mals, you must eat an animal’s heart.” 

“ I’ve eaten a chicken’s heart, but I can’t un- 
derstand chicken talk,” said Rosalie. 

“And I’ve eaten turkeys’ hearts and lambs’ 
hearts, but I can’t understand turkeys and 
lambs,” said Kitty, smiling. 

“ They must have been common chickens and 
turkeys and lambs,” I said. “It must be one 
that is different from any other — a white raven 
with a single black breast-feather, or a fox with 
only one white hair in the end of his tail.” 

Kitty laughed. “ That’s a fairy story, Lucy ; 
fairy stories are not true.” 

I was silent for a moment. I knew, of course, 
that fairy stories were not true, but it always 
vexed me to have people say so, in that superior 
tone. Then I said : “ They used to be true. 
Perhaps they are true now ; with the right per- 
sons perhaps they are true.” 

“Well,” said Kitty, still laughing, “maybe I 
am one of the right persons. I’ll be on the look- 
out for a black lamb with a white curl in the mid- 
dle of his forehead. Come, let’s go on.” 

It was a clover field that we came to next, and 


21 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


beyond it was a blueberry pasture. I wanted to 
stay and pick blueberries, but Kitty said no, wait 
till we had more time. They were just beginning 
to be ripe, she said ; there was time enough. 

“ See that big rock down there ? ” said Rosalie, 
pointing to a great boulder in one corner of the 
field. “ That’s Sam Cobb’s biscuit.” 

“ What a funny name ! ” I exclaimed. “ What 
do you call it that for ? ” 

“ Because it’s the name of it,” said Rosalie. 

“ Sam Cobb was a man who used to live here,” 
Kitty explained, “ and they call it that because it 
looks like a biscuit and it belonged to him.” 

“ So it does,” I agreed ; “ like a raised-biscuit. 

“ It looks like a giant’s gravestone,” I continued. 

“ So it does,” said Kitty, c< I never thought of 
that.” 

“ Or it might be a witch’s house, or the door 
of a dwart’s cave,” I went on. 

“ A what? ” asked Rosalie. 

“ A dwarf. They live under the ground, and 
have big rocks over their doorways. You can’t 
tell them yourself unless you have the fairy sight, 
but animals can see what people can’t.” 

“ Rover,” said Kitty, pointing to the rock, “ is 
that a dwarf s door? ” 

Rover barked one deep bark and Prince a lot 

\ 


22 


I AM “ PERSONALLY CONDUCTED ” 


of noisy ones. Prince ran a little way toward the 
rock, harked at it, and ran back again. 

“H ow funny they act,” said Kitty. “ It must 
be a dwarf* s door. Let’s go knock, and ask if 
he is at home.” 

“ Oh no ! ” I said, shrinking away. Of course 
I did not truly believe this nonsense, but I liked 
to make believe. I did it so thoroughly that 
1 really thought I was afraid. 

“ What would he do to us ? ” asked Rosalie. 

“Turn us to stone, or something,” I whispered. 

Kitty walked slowly toward the rock, smiling 
roguishly. I felt a delicious thrill of fear. “ Oh 
don’t, Kitty ! ” I entreated. 

Kitty went on, with Prince at her heels yap- 
ping and sniffing the ground. “ Run, Rosalie, 
run ! ” I cried ; and we ran away as fast as we 
could go, till we reached the orchard. 

Kitty came after us, laughing and out of breath. 
“ You little humbugs ! ” she said. 

Without giving us a chance to reply, she began 
to point out the greenings, the baldwins, the nod- 
heads, the russets, the porters, the pumpkin 
sweets, and all the other trees. She showed me 
one with a crotch in it large enough for a seat. 
She climbed up. “ See, isn’t this a nice place to 
sit? ” she asked. 


23 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Then she jumped down again. “ Let me 
boost you, Lucy,” she said, and she lifted me as 
high as she could ; but not being a good climber, 
I had to give it up. Rosalie did better ; and she 
looked so romantic sitting among the green 
leaves, that I made up my mind to “ try, try 
again,” until I was able to do it. I wanted to 
try then, but Kitty said no, the garden came 
next. 

We went right into the garden, and had walked 
along three rows of tomatoes before I remembered 
that Cousin Sally told us not to go there. 

“Kitty!” I exclaimed. “Your mother said 
we mustn't come here ! ” 

“ Why, she knew I would,” replied Kitty. 

“ But she said not to,” 1 persisted. 

Kitty turned and faced me. “You think that 
I'm not minding my mother, do you ? ” she cried. 
“ But I am. She's my mother ; don't you s’pose 
/know when she means things and when she 
don't ? ” 

I thought it a queer way to mind one's mother, 
but I said no more. We walked in single file, 
Kitty ahead, then I, then Rosalie, up and down 
every aisle of the garden, and then we came to 
the strawberry beds. 

The moment I saw them I expected to find 

24 


I AM “ PERSONALLY CONDUCTED 


some berries, and was disappointed when Kitty 
said that strawberries were “ all gone by.” 

“ Mother put up the last a week ago,” said 
she. “ But raspberries are beginning to be ripe, 
and we may have all we want ; so let’s go eat 
some.” 

The raspberry bushes grew along the stone 
wall that separated the garden from the road. 
There were a few ripe berries, big, dark red, and 
sweet, and they quenched my sudden thirst for 
strawberries. 

“ Some day soon we are going raspberrying,” 
said Kitty, “ and perhaps mother will take you 
and Rosalie. We are going to take a lunch, and 
pick all day.” 

I was delighted. I had never been berrying 
in my life, but I had read stories about children 
who had, and I thought that it must be one of 
the pleasantest things in the world to go on a 
berry picnic. I asked Kitty questions about it, 
until she brought me back to our sight-seeing by 
bidding me observe the heavy clusters on the cur- 
rant bushes, and the bloom beginning to show 
on the peaches, pears, plums, and crab-apples. 

When we returned to the yard she called on 
me to admire the pine-tree — a Norway pine she 
said it was — and the great maple ; she told me 

25 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


what a lot of lilacs and blush roses the bushes by 
the front steps had borne this summer ; she led 
me around the flower-beds, to make me count 
the heads of pink geranium ; she held me tight 
while I peeped down the well behind the house ; 
she pointed out the few houses to be seen up the 
road, and told me who lived in them. “ And 
now,” said she, “ it’s supper-time/’ 

“ O Kitty ! ” I exclaimed, in disappointment. 
“ Can't we go over in the woods ? ” 

“Sometime. Not now. It’s supper-time. 
Aren’t you hungry ? ” 

I had not thought about it, I had been so in- 
terested; but now I felt a pang of hunger, and 
gladly followed her toward the house. 

“ But after supper we can go over in the woods, 
can’t we? ” I asked. 

“ It will be dark after supper. Besides, I’ve 
got to go for Fannie.” 

“To-morrow, then?” I begged. 

“ Perhaps,” she half promised. 


26 



CHAPTER III 

IN WHICH I SEE A NEW KIND OF FOG 



E had bread and milk and hot gingerbread 


t f for supper. I noticed with satisfaction 
that there was no cream on the milk. I did not 
like cream when I was a little girl. 

“ Fannie isn’t a cream cow, is she. Cousin 
Sally ? said I, as I crumbed my bread. 

“ No, she's a red cow,” answered Cousin Sally. 
cc Brown, you mean,” Kitty corrected. 
cc She’s what you call a red cow,” her mother 
rejoined. 

“ I don’t mean that,” I said. “ I mean, she 
doesn’t have cream on her milk.” 

“ Doesn’t have cream on her milk ! ” exclaimed 
Kitty. Cousin Sally’s face turned red and she 
looked at me sharply ; she thought that I was 
finding fault with the milk she had given me. 


27 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Aunt Eunice smiled. “ We skim off the cream 
to make butter,” she said. “ All milk has cream 
on it after it stands awhile. Doesn't Mr. 
Crowe's milk always have cream on it ? '' 

“ Yes,” I answered ; c< a lot. I have to skin 
and skin, even after Grandma thinks she has 
taken it all off for me. I thought perhaps cows 
were different about cream. I was going to wish 
that Mr. Crowe's cow were like yours.” 

il Mr. Crowe’s cow ! ” said Kitty, laughing 
again. “ Why, Lucy, Mr. Crowe has ten cows.” 

“ I wish we had ten cows,” said Rosalie. “ Then 
we could sell milk and butter, and I could ride 
to town on the wagon.” 

“ Well, I don’t want ten cows, if I have got to 
milk them myself,” said her mother, emphatically. 
“ I think it's a shame for Bert to go playing base- 
ball every evening. I've done the chores for a 
week, and I think it’s time somebody else took 
hold.” 

“ Why didn’t you tell him to come home ? You 
never say a word against his going,” said Kitty. 

“ Oh, well, if the boy wants to have a good 
time, let him,” her mother returned in an indul- 
gent tone. 

“ Molly and the boys won't be home to-night,” 
said Kitty to me. 


28 


I SEE A NEW KIND OF FOG 


“ The boys ? What boys ? ” I asked. 

“ Why, our boys. Didn’t you know that I 
had three brothers ? ” said Kitty, teasingly. 

“ You haven’t, Kitty Reed ! ” 

“ She means Phil and Dick,” said Rosalie. 

“ They are young men who board with us,” 
Cousin Sally explained. “ They work at the 
Corn-shop, making cans.” 

“ Why aren’t they coming home ? ” I ques- 
tioned. 

“ They are all going down to Morrill’s Cor- 
ner. The boys are going to play ball and then 
they will all go to the lodge, and they’ll stay over 
night, with some friends of theirs.” 

“ The lodge ? What is ‘lodge ’ ? ” 

cc Why, they belong to a temperance society, 
and it is lodge night.” 

“ Is it like Mason lodge ? Grandpa belongs 
to that.” 

<c Something ; not exactly.” 

“ Cousin Sally,” I asked, cc when do you milk 
the cow ? ” 

“ After supper,” she answered. “ If you want 
to see me, you may, if you don’t get too sleepy 
before Fannie comes home. Kitty is going after 
her right away, but sometimes she strays off, and 
it’s hard to find her.” 


29 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ May I go with Kitty ? ” I asked. 

“ No, not to-night,” said Cousin Sally. 

Kitty went for Fannie, and Cousin Sally fetched 
Charlie home from a nearer field. While she 
was tending him Rosalie and I tried to swing, 
but we could not go very high because there 
was no one to push us. 

“ I wish we had Dick here to swing us,” said 
Rosalie. “ He swings me every time I want 
him to. He swings me till my toes touch the 
wall. Did you ever swing as high as that ? ” 

“ Once I did,” said I. “ It was at the islands. 
I swung ’way up into the tree and ’way out over 
the bank. A man pushed me. I was scared ; it 
seemed as if I were swinging over the water, and 
I felt as if I should fall.” 

“ Did you holler to him to stop ? ” asked 
Rosalie. 

“No; I didn’t like to.” 

“ Why not ? ” 

“ I didn’t want him to know that I was scared. 
I kept thinking he would stop ; but he didn’t, he 
pushed me higher and higher.” 

“What did you do ? ” 

cc I just held on, and shut my eyes, and scringed 
inside, till he got through,” I answered. 

“ I’d have hollered, if I’d wanted to,” said 


30 


I SEE A NEW KIND OF FOG 


Rosalie ; “ but I shouldn’t want to. I shouldn’t 
be scared. I wish I had a swing like that. This 
one doesn’t go high enough for me ; I’d like to 
go fifty hundred times higher.” 

I did not reply, but I thought to myself that 
she must be braver than I was. 

Kitty was gone a long time. The chickens 
went into the coops, under their mothers’ wings, 
and the dogs took their forty winks on the piazza. 
Rosalie and I sat on the steps and talked, while 
we fought off midges and mosquitoes, which 
swarmed about us. Away in front and to the 
right of us were woods, and as twilight began to 
grow a mist rose from the ground, rose and rose 
until it reached half-way up the tree-trunks, like 
a pale, purple wall. It was beautiful. I asked 
Rosalie what it was, and she said, “ Fog.” 

cc Why, it isn’t like the fog in Portland,” said 
I. “ The fog in Portland is white or else gray, 
and it comes toward you out of the air, over the 
water ; it doesn’t come up out of the ground. I 
didn’t know fog ever came up out of the ground. 
I didn’t know there was any fog in the country.” 

“Well, there is; there is every night,” said 
Rosalie. 

“ Are those woods just like other woods ? ” I 
asked. 


3i 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Yes,” said Rosalie. 

“ Have you ever been there ? ” 

“ No,” she said. 

“ Then how do you know they are like other 
woods ? ” 

“ Because they look like the other woods,” she 
answered. 

“ There isn’t any fog in front of the woods 
across the road,” I said by way of argument. 

Rosalie admitted this, but she persisted in 
declaring that all woods were alike. She said 
that she had been in all the other woods there 
were, and they were just exactly alike. 

But I knew better. I myself had been in 
several woods, which differed considerably. And 
I had never heard or read about such a fog. I 
felt in my heart that there must be enchantment 
about it, it looked so mysterious and wonderful. 
I resolved to ask Kitty to go over there some 
day. 

I watched the mist as it drew denser. The 
tops of high bushes lifted out of it, like islands 
above the sea. I thought how different the fog 
at home was ; how it sailed in from the harbor, 
high in air, till it came to our garden, and then 
how some of it settled softly down through the 
tree-tops and the rest of it went flying and float- 
32 


I SEE A NEW KIND OF FOG 


ing over our house and Aunt Priscilla’s. The 
recollection made me homesick ; but just as I 
began to feel that way Fannie and Kitty came 
through the gate, Fannie vigorously switching her 
sides with her tail, and Kitty brushing about with 
an alder twig. 

“ Don’t the skeeters bite ? ” Kitty cried. “ Oh, 
I’ve had the awfullest time ! Somebody let the 
bars down, and Fannie got out and went ’most a 
mile up the road. I hunted in the woods first, 
but Sam Jensen told me where she’d gone, and I 
after her lickerty-cut. She’s always up to some 
new trick. 

<c I tell you, Lucy,” she continued as we 
walked by her side, “ it’s no joke keeping a cow. 
You don’t know how lucky you are to be a city 
girl.” 

“ Does she run away often ? ” I asked, sympa- 
thetically. 

“ Whenever she gets a chance,” was Kitty’s 
answer. 

“ Kitty,” I said, “ why don’t you take her 
painter along and tie her to a tree ? ” 

“ Her painter ? ” Kitty repeated in a puzzled 
tone. “ What do you mean by her painter ? ” 

“ The rope that was hanging in her bin,” said 
I. “You said it was to tie her up with.” 

33 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Kitty began to laugh. “ In her bin ! ” she re- 
peated derisively. “ We don't keep our cow in 
a bin, we keep her in a stall ; and I guess it's a 
halter you’re talking about. What in the world 
is a painter ? ” 

“ The rope they tie boats with,” I answered 
meekly. I felt foolish, and made up my mind 
to be careful and not ask any more questions. I 
did not like to be laughed at. 

Cousin Sally had done the chores and was 
waiting for Fannie, a little out of sorts at having 
to wait so long. She put a lantern down on the 
barn floor, and sat upon a small stool beside the 
cow. The milking was a remarkable perform- 
ance to me. I was very much interested. I 
crouched close to her and watched. Twice I 
asked her if it didn’t hurt the cow. 

“ No,” she answered, rather sharply the second 
time. “ Do you suppose she would stand stock- 
still if it hurt her ? What a foolish question ! ” 

So I asked no more questions, but watched and 
marvelled. The faint lantern-light made the 
dark barn seem full of hobgoblins ; Cousin Sally 
was a witch ; I was a story-book girl having an 

adventure. At length “I want to go to bed,” 

said Rosalie, sleepily, coming from the carriage- 
house, where Kitty had been swinging her. 

34 


I SEE A NEW KIND OF FOG 


“ Well,” her mother replied, “tell Kitty to put 
you to bed.” 

“ Come, Lucy,” said Rosalie. 

“ I don’t want to go now,” I said ; <c I want to 
see the cow all milked.” 

“ Yes*, you must,” Rosalie insisted. “ Mother, 
make Lucy come to bed.” 

“Yes, Lucy,” said Cousin Sally; “go with 
Rosalie. You know your mother told you to be 
good, and mind Aunt Eunice and me.” 

I wondered how she knew what my mother 
told me. I got up and followed Rosalie. As we 
went out of the barn Charlie began to stamp in 
his stall and whinny. “ What makes him do like 
that ? ” I asked. 

“ Because — horses always do that way,” Kitty 
answered. 

“ Do they ? ” I said. “ What makes them P ” 

“ Oh, I don’t know,” she said, impatiently. 
“ What makes you open your eyes, and talk and 
walk and run ? ” 

“ Why — because,” was my lame reason. 

“Well,” she returned, triumphantly, “that’s 
just what makes horses act their way — because.” 

I felt very much snubbed, and silently fol- 
lowed her to the house. It was dark now, and the 
stars were coming out. There was a shrill sound 
35 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


in the air, but I was so downcast that I did not 
ask Kitty what it was. 

She got a light, and we went up to the sitting- 
room chamber. The room seemed all white. 
There were two bedsteads with starched valances 
around them. On one bed our night-gowns were 
laid out, and my empty valise hung on a bed- 
post. Suddenly into my mind came my mother’s 
parting charge, to shake out my dresses. I was 
conscience-stricken. A great wave of mother- 
sickness swept over me ; my heart was flooded 
with it. All at once I felt tired and sleepy and 
desolate. Yet, even at the same time, I noticed 
that Rosalie was putting on a nightcap, and the 
fact surprised and amused me. I went to sleep 
with those two ideas following each other through 
my brain : “ I want my mother ! Rosalie wears a 
nightcap ! How funny she looks ! Mother, 
mother ! — Rosalie, nightcap, funny — mother, 
mother ! ” 


36 



CHAPER IV 

IN WHICH WE BEGIN WITH WAR AND END 
WITH PEAS 



HEN I woke up in the morning the sun 


▼ ▼ was shining through closed blinds directly 
on one of the brass knobs of Aunt Eunice’s big 
mahogany bureau, and the brass knob reflected 
the gleam to my eyes. I blinked and moved my 
head out of its way, and in doing so hit Rosalie’s 
head and wakened her. 

“ Let’s get up,” I said. 

“ No,” she answered, drowsily ; “ I don’t want 


to. 


“ I’m going to,” said I, starting to slip out of 
bed ; but she seized my sleeve and held me fast, 
and when I tried to pull it away she kicked me. 

“You lie still,” she commanded; “I don’t 
want to get up yet.” 


37 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


I remembered that last evening Rosalie’s will 
had to be my way, and, thinking discretion the 
better part of valor, lay down again. But every 
moment of waiting was hard ; for from outside 
came the twitter of birds, the crowing of roosters, 
the cluck-cluck of the mother hens, and the sun- 
shine suggested pleasant things. As soon as 
Rosalie dropped off, loosing her hold of me, I sat 
up cautiously and looked at her. How funny 
she looked ! Her curls were tucked out of sight 
in the nightcap, and her round face was framed 
by the ruffle like a white-frilled daisy. 

I put one foot out of bed, and was about to 
spring down, when she woke again, and gave me 
another vigorous kick. This was more than flesh 
and blood could stand ; I kicked back and 
scrambled out in hot haste. 

That roused her in earnest, and she jumped out 
after me. I was no match for Rosalie, either in 
strength or pugnacity, and I should have run 
away if I had not hurt my foot when I kicked her ; 
but I could not escape. As I put up my arm to 
fend her off, the door opened, and Aunt Eunice 
came in. 

“ Highty-tighty ! ” she exclaimed. “ What’s 
this ? A quarrel ? What is the matter with your 
foot, Lucy ? ” 


38 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


“ I hurt it,” I answered, “ when I kicked Rosa- 
lie.” 

“ A pretty story to tell !” said Aunt Eunice. 
“ What did you do that for ? ” 

“ Because she kicked me,” I replied. 

“ Twice,” said Rosalie, in a boastful tone. 

“ You are a naughty girl,” said her grandmother, 
sternly. “ You ought to be ashamed to treat 
your visitor so.” 

“ I didn’t want her to get up,” said Rosalie, as 
if that were sufficient excuse. “ But I don’t mind 
now — I guess I’ll get up myself. Let’s see which 
can dress first, Lucy.” 

We hurried into our clothes, and Rosalie won 
the race. I was always slow. But when she 
took off the nightcap and her tangled curls fell 
over her shoulders, I plucked up heart ; my hair 
was shingled and only needed parting. 

“ It will take you a long time to comb your 
hair,” I said, suggestively. 

“ I can’t comb it myself,” she replied. “ It 
never gets combed till afternoon ; folks are too 
busy.” 

Aunt Eunice had been putting the beds to air 
while we were dressing ; now she came and but- 
toned our clothes. “ Go feed the chickens,” she 
said, “ and then watch for Kitty. When you see 


39 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


her coming let me know, so that I can put break- 
fast on the table. Then run and call your 
mother. Now off with you.” 

It was a beautiful morning, with a soft, warm 
breeze. All the grass, everywhere, was glittering 
like a sheet of silver. When I went close to it I 
found that the grass and clover were covered and 
bound together with delicate webs that held shin- 
ing dewdrops in their meshes. All the fields 
were spread with them. It looked like jewelled 
lacework — as if fairies had been spinning over- 
night. Every drop flashed with rainbow colors ; 
you could have put your hands down and scooped 
up a hundred rubies, sapphires, and emeralds at 
once. I asked Rosalie what made it so. 

“ Spiders. They do it every morning,” she 
answered. 

Then I remembered that I had often seen a 
spider’s web here or there in our garden at home, 
laden with morning dewdrops, and had thought 
even that strangely beautiful ; but to see all the 
world decked with gossamer and gems was a 
wonder indeed. 

Rover had gone with Kitty to pasture the cow, 
but Prince was waiting for us, and you would 
have thought that he had not seen us for a 
month, he was so joyful. He wagged all over ; 

40 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


every part of him was in commotion, and he 
barked, leaped, and raced around, all at the same 
time. 

We fed the chickens, calling, “ Biddy, biddy, 
biddy!” and cc Chick, chick, chick ! ” and laugh- 
ing at their cunning, comical ways. Then we 
counted them, to make sure that all were there. 
Then we went to swing on the gate and watch 
for Kitty. 

Soon we saw her coming, bareheaded, carrying 
her hat carefully, and when we ran to her we 
found that it was full of raspberries ; she had 
lined it with leaves and filled it to the brim ; they 
were for breakfast, she said. 

They were delicious. I had a large saucerful, 
sprinkled thick with sugar. They were the nicest 
raspberries that I have ever eaten in my life. We 
had raised-biscuit with them. I think they must 
have been a particular kind of raised-biscuit, for l 
have never since tasted any quite like them or 
quite so good. 

After breakfast Kitty said that she would show 
me the parlor before she started for school. The 
parlor was kept dark, all the blinds being closed 
and the shades down, so at first we could not see 
very well ; but Kitty let in a little light, and our 
eyes soon got used to the duskiness. Between 

41 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


the front windows was a table with pink mosquito- 
netting thrown over the table-cloth. 

“ There,” said Kitty, proudly, lifting the net, 
“see that table-cloth! Isn’t it a beauty? My 
mother worked that before she was married. 
Just think, it’s older than I am — older than 
Molly! How do you s’pose she ever did it? 
It took her months.” 

It was of blue broadcloth, worked with worsted 
flowers, a garland of roses in many shades of red 
and white and green. There were two ottomans 
to match it. I thought them all wonderful. 
Kitty showed me the place where her father once 
took a few stitches — “ Only he wasn’t my father 
then, you know,” said she, “ because I wasn’t 
born.” They were unlike the other stitches — 
crossed the wrong way, and “ all roughed up ” 
— but her mother had not picked them out.. 
She showed me “ the hole a moth-miller made ” 
'the very summer it was finished. “ But it’s the 
only one,” she said, “ for ever since then we’ve 
looked it over carefully once a week all through 
moth-miller time.” Then she covered it with 
the netting again. 

Then she led me to the whatnot, which was 
crowded with pretty things. There was a house 
covered with shells, and there were ornaments 


42 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


and daguerreotypes. But the two upper shelves 
were the most attractive ; they were full of little 
sugar-and-flour paste figures, such as were sold for 
a cent or two in the candy-shops at that time — 
animals and birds, fastened on foundations of 
pink, or white, or yellow. There were dozens of 
them. There were a barley-sugar lamb, too ; a 
red and white striped candy-basket, containing 
hearts, diamonds, and ovals, which were printed 
with pink-lettered sentiments — such as, for in- 
stance, “ I Am Thine,” “ Will You Be Mine?” 
“ When Can I See Your Pa? ” ; a tiny bird-cage 
of pink candy and white lace, holding a yellow 
bird ; a white candy pillow with chocolate-faced 
twin babies bound to it by a checkerberry band ; 
and a twisted pipestem cane. I never saw such a 
collection anywhere else outside a candy-store. 
“ O Kitty! O Rosalie!” I cried in rapture. 
“ Where did you get them ? ” 

“ We had them Christmas,” said Rosalie. 

Now, I had a sweet tooth, and it filled me with 
astonishment to think of their withstanding such 
temptation from Christmas till summer time. 
“ Don't you like candy ? ” I asked. 

“ Like it ? ” said Kitty. “ Of course we do. 
But this candy isn't good to eat ; it's made to 
look at. Besides, it's too pretty to eat.” 


43 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ We had some other candy,” said Rosalie; 
“ this isn’t the only kind we had. We ate a lot.” 

“ But, don’t you feel like eating candy any 
other time? all the time? — if you could get it, I 
mean.” 

“ Oo ! Yes ! ” said Rosalie, smacking her lips. 
" But this is to keep, and I don’t want to eat it.” 

I did not make any reply, but I wondered at 
them. I did not understand it, and I don’t un- 
derstand it to this day. 

Rosalie, Prince, and I went down the road a lit- 
tle way with Kitty when she started for school, 
and coming back we thought that we would go 
into the woods. 

By this time the twinkling web-work over the 
grass had disappeared ; but the dew had not 
dried up ; it had only rolled down among the 
herbage, so that the first step we took into the 
wayside wet our feet. At the same moment 
Cousin Sally’s voice rang out from the dooryard : 
“ Here, here ! where are you going? Come out 
of that wet grass this instant ! Come here ; I 
want you.” 

“ It seems as if I never should get into the 
woods,” I said, wistfully, as we obeyed. 

“ What do you want to go in the woods so 
for ? ” Rosalie asked. 


44 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


“ Oh, because,” said I. 

“ Why ? ” she persisted, curiously. 

“ They are so beautiful,” I answered. 

“ Do you think they are beautifuller than the 
orchard ? ” she asked. 

“ Oh, yes,” I said, with decision. 

“ They're not,” said Rosalie, with quite as 
much decision. And then she asked : “ Why ? ” 

“ The orchard isn’t so mystery-ous,” I said. 

“ What does that mean ? ” she asked. 

Now, I did not knowhow to tell her. I liked 
the woods because they were so full of dim, green 
lights and shadows, and because, whichever way 
you looked, there was some little, lovely opening, 
leading you did not know where, and seeming to 
promise : “ Come this way and you shall see some- 
thing more satisfactory than anything you have 
seen yet.” I hesitated, and tried to put my idea 
into words, but did not succeed very well. “ Be- 
cause they are so greenery and whithersoever,” I 
said. 

Rosalie did not understand, and I don’t wonder 
that she didn’t. But when Rosalie did not un- 
derstand anything, she laughed at it; she used to 
go into peals of merriment over some of my most 
serious answers ; and I had the very foolish fault 
of feeling uncomfortable when I was laughed at. 

45 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Rosalie laughed now, laughed and laughed, but 
when her mother asked her what she was laugh- 
ing at, she could not tell. “ It’s something Lucy 
said about the woods,” she replied. “ I can’t re- 
member what it was, but it’s the funniest thing 
I ever heard of;” and off she went into fresh 
peals of laughter. 

“You silly child,” said Cousin Sally, laughing 
a little, too. “ Here’s something more sensible 
to do than laughing at you don’t know what. 
Grandma wants you to shell peas for her. You 
and Lucy can take the pan here on the piazza.” 

“ I don’t want to shell peas,” said Rosalie. 
“ Lucy and I want to ” 

“ Want to what ? ” her mother asked. 

Rosalie hesitated. She did not know what she 
wanted to do. “ Go up in the barn chamber,” she 
answered, on the spur of the moment. 

“You must shell the peas first,” said her 
mother. 

“ Can’t we take the peas up there ? ” Rosalie 
asked. 

“ Ye — s,” said her mother, doubtfully ; “ you 
may if you will promise to do them right straight 
off and bring them down, so that Grandma can 
have them to pick over and wash.” 

Rosalie promised, and with the basket of peas 
46 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


and a pan we started for the barn chamber. We 
had to climb a ladder something like a ship’s lad- 
der to get to it. It was a large, empty room — 
that is, empty excepting for some things piled up 
in one corner and some old harness and rope 
hanging against the wall. 

Reaching almost to the floor was a window, 
wide open, looking out on the yard and the 
woods. We sat down before it and began our 
task ; but the world seen from that window 
looked so different, so beautifully different from 
the way it looked when we stood on the ground, 
that I paid more attention to it than to the peas. 
I felt as if I had discovered a new world. I 
would keep seeing something that pleased or sur- 
prised me, and then Rosalie would have to look, 
too, and we would talk about it ; so that before 
we were half done we heard Aunt Eunice calling : 
“ Children, aren’t those peas ready yet ? ” 

For a minute or two we pretended not to hear, 
we were so ashamed to say no ; but Aunt Eunice 
called again : “ Children, aren’t those peas ready 
yet ? ” and Rosalie had to answer. 

“ Bring them here, and I’ll help finish,” her 
grandmother returned. 

We prepared to go down. Rosalie took the 
basket and I took the pan of shelled peas, but 
47 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


there was the heap of pods on the floor. “ What 
shall we do with the pods ? ” I asked. 

“ We must take them to the pig after we get 
them all,” said Rosalie. 

“ We shall have to come up again and get 
them,” said I ; “ we can’t take them now.” 

“ I can take them now, in my apron,” she re- 
turned. 

“ You can’t carry them and the basket too,” I 
objected. 

“ No, that’s so,” she replied. “ Lucy ” — as if 
a bright idea had struck her — “ let’s throw them 
out.” 

“Then we shall have to pick them up. I’ll 
tell you what let’s do ; let’s tie a rope to the 
basket and lower it down.” 

“ Oh, yes, let’s,” Rosalie gayly agreed. 

So we got a long rope from the wall and tied 
it as strongly as we could to the handle of the 
basket. We decided to put the pan of peas into 
the basket, and then we could each take part of 
the pods. We lifted the basket over the window 
ledge and lowered away, but as it went down it 
grew heavy and so nearly pulled us after it that 
to save ourselves we had to let go. At the same 
time our knot unfastened. 

Bang, bang ! “ Cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep ! ” 

48 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


“ K-a-r-r-r-e ! ” “ Bow -wow -wow -wow -wow- 
wow ! ” “ Bow-wow-wow !” <c For mercy's sake, 
what is the matter P ” That was the chorus that 
arose as we sank down among the pea-pods and 
looked at each other with frightened eyes. 

“ Mother will kill us ! ” Rosalie half whispered, 
at length. 

“ O Rosalie ! ” I cried. “ She won’t ! ” 

“ She will,” Rosalie declared. “ And when 
Molly and the boys come home and find there 
aren’t any peas for supper, they’ll kill us, too.” 

Of course I knew that she didn’t really mean 
what she said ; we were not likely to be killed, 
even once : but I was afraid Cousin Sally might 
send me home ; that was what Rosalie’s “ kill ” 
meant to me. I was picturing myself sadly and 
silently riding away by Mr. Crowe’s side, when 
Aunt Eunice called again : “ Come down and 
help the chickens pick up these peas.” 

In an instant we had our heads out of the 
window. Sure enough, there were the chickens 
busily pick-picking as if their very lives depended 
on it, while the mother hens had their necks 
craned between the bars of their coops in vain 
effort to reach the field of action. Rosalie, whose 
spirits always came right back to the surface, like 
a cork in water, began to laugh ; but with the 
49 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


thought of being sent home in disgrace weight- 
ing mine down, I could not see anything to even 
smile at. 

Aunt Eunice was standing in the doorway. 
“ Rover, ” she said to the hound, “go and tell 
those chickens that you think they have had 
enough. 

“And you two scapegraces,” she continued, 
looking up at us, “ come down here and pick up 
every single pea, or you sha’n’t have any for sup- 
per.” 

We picked them up, while Rover and Prince 
kept off marauders. When we presented our- 
selves before Aunt Eunice we were two very dirty 
little girls. She made us wash our hands, and 
then tell her how we came to drop the basket out 
of the window. 

“Now that was a silly thing to do,” she said. 
“ What did you want to do so for ? Why 
couldn’t you have gone up after the pods ? ” 

Although we had no special reason to give, I 
felt that some explanation was needed ; and after 
a moment’s hesitation I answered: “To save 
time.” 

Aunt Eunice suddenly put her apron to her 
face. I thought that she was crying, and I felt 
heavy-hearted. Rosalie, also, seemed much con- 
50 


WE BEGIN WITH WAR 


cerned. “ We’ll go and get them now, Grand- 
ma,” she said. 

“Very well,” Aunt Eunice replied in a muffled 
voice, as if she found it difficult to speak at all. 
But when we came back with the pods, tiptoeing, 
half afraid to enter on her grief, she was moving 
about her work, with a cheerful face. She gave 
us each a short-cake, made of the leavings of her 
piecrust, and sent us off to carry the pods to the 
pig, bidding us be careful and not give him basket 
and all. 


5 r 



CHAPTER V 

IN WHICH, FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 

O N our way back Rosalie said : “ What shall 
we play ? ” 

“ Let’s go up in the barn chamber and look 
out of the window,” I proposed. 

“ I’m tired of that,” she replied. “ Let’s play 
house. I’ll let you have one of my dolls. I’ll 
let you have half of my playthings, too. Come 
in the sitting-room ; they’re under the piano.” 

We went into the sitting-room, and she got 
out her playthings. She had some little chairs, 
a sofa, a bed, a table, a clothes-horse, and some 
dishes of various kinds. Among them were two 
pitchers of bronze glass, which greatly took my 
fancy. They were bronze at top and bottom, 
and the middle part looked as if it were sanded. 
“ O Rosalie ! ” I exclaimed, <c let me have one of 
those?” And she consented. 


52 



FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 


One of the pitchers was somewhat broken ; I 
reached for the whole one. 

“ You can’t have that one,” she said ; “ I want 
that one myself.” 

I was disappointed ; but I put it back without 
protest, for, of course, they were her things. 

“ But you may choose chairs,” she said. 

So I chose one made of willow, with a green 
bottom, and one a little smaller, a wooden rocker. 
But Rosalie objected again. “You can’t have 
both the big ones,” she said. 

“ Then let me have both the little ones,” said 
I. “I don’t like things so different ; I want 
them to match.” 

cc No ; they’re mine, and I’m going to have 
what I want,” she said, stubbornly. 

“ Then I won’t play,” I exclaimed in anger. 

“ I don’t care ; I don’t want you to,” she re- 
torted. 

I went out into the kitchen. Aunt Eunice was 
busily stepping back and forth between the pantry 
and the stove with pans of cookies, and she did 
not notice me. Pretty soon Rosalie came out. 
Then Aunt Eunice asked : “ Can’t you find any- 
thing to play ? ” 

“ Lucy won’t play,” said Rosalie. 

“ She doesn’t want me to play,” said I. 

53 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


cc Oh, there ! I should be ashamed ! What’s 
the matter ? ” 

“ She wants everything her own way,” I com- 
plained. 

“ She wants all the best things,” said Ros- 
alie. 

“ No, I don’t,” I disputed her. “ I only want 
things that match. I want the big chairs or else 
the little ones.” 

“ Bring your things here and put them on the 
table,” said Aunt Eunice. “ Put all the big 
things on one end of the table and all the little 
ones on the other end.” 

Rosalie did so, putting the broken pitcher with 
the little things. 

“ Now get your dolls,” said her grandmother. 

Rosalie brought the dolls. One was a large 
china-headed doll, and the other was small, with 
a Parian head. The small one was the prettier, 
but the large one had the most clothes. 

“ Now,” said Aunt Eunice, not leaving her 
cookies, but talking as she worked, “ one of you 
have the big things one day and the other the 
little ones, and the next day change about. How 
will that do ? ” 

“ That will do,” we assented, relieved and 
pleased with the arrangement. 

54 


FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 


“ And why don’t you take your things up to 
the barn chamber ? One of you can have one 
side of the room and one the other. The beams 
will make good shelves for your dishes.” 

Rosalie skipped with delight at the idea. 

It took several trips to carry everything up 
there, but when we had done so and placed 
them in position along opposite sides of the 
room, we both exclaimed : “ Don’t they look 
nice ? ” 

Rosalie said that I might have the big things 
to-day. My doll, she said, was named Tilly, and 
hers was Lilly. 

I did not like the name “ Tilly,” so I pro- 
posed naming my doll over again. 

“ What are you going to name her ? ” Rosalie 
asked. 

“ Dolladine,” I answered. “ In my c Chimes 
for Childhood’ there’s a piece of poetry about a 
doll named that, and a picture of her, too ; and 
she is perfectly lovely.” 

“ What does she look like ? ” 

“ It tells in the poetry. It says : 

« This is her picture — Dolladine — 

The most beautiful doll that ever was seen ! 

Oh, what nosegays ! Oh, what sashes ! 

Oh, what beautiful eyes and lashes ! 


55 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


* Oh, what a precious, perfect pet ! 

On each instep a pink rosette ; 

Little blue shoes for her little wee tots ; 

Elegant ribbon in bows and knots.’ ” 

“ Isn’t that sweet ! ” exclaimed Rosalie. “ I 
want that name for my doll. You can get an- 
other for Tilly.” 

I thought of a number of names, but none 
seemed appropriate. At length I settled on 
Zareffa, the name of a dancer in the “Arabian 
Nights.” “It means ‘elegant/ and I think that 
her clothes are elegant, Rosalie,” I said. 

Rosalie looked pleased. “ Oh,” she returned, 
“ they’re nothing to what she’s going to have 
when Molly gets time to sew for her.” 

We played all the forenoon ; we took our chil- 
dren to walk, to school, to church, to a dance, and 
to the islands. Aunt Eunice sent Rover to the 
foot of the stairs with a paper bag of cookies in 
his mouth, and then we gave a party. 

But after dinner we did not want to play dolls. 
I did not care much for dolls, as a usual thing, 
although once in a while I liked to play with 
them. If I could have had the kind of doll that 
I wanted — one with joints and real hair — I should 
have cared for her ; but I did not care for com- 
mon ones, with heads like graven images, and 
56 


FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 


with no “ give ” to them. The way that I en- 
joyed dolls best was to dress them at night and 
leave them sitting in their chairs, and then to im- 
agine that while I was asleep they came to life 
and had a lovely time. 

We swung awhile, and wandered around the 
yard and the house ; then Rosalie put Prince 
through some tricks ; and then I proposed going 
up to the barn chamber again. “ I’ve thought of 
a new way of looking out of the window,” I 
said. 

The new way was to lie down on the floor 
with our heads toward the window, and look out 
backward. We could see the tops of trees stir- 
ring in the breeze, and also great white clouds 
sailing over the blue. 

“ Rosalie,” I said, “ did you ever find stories 
in the clouds ? ” 

cc No,” she answered. “ How do you ? ” 

“ See that little white cloud. Don't you think 
it looks like a bird ? ” 

“ Like a white pigeon,” said Rosalie. 

“ And that big one is an eagle.” 

“ Are eagles white ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” I answered, “ but cloud eagles 
are. And that monstrous big one is a mountain 
with valleys, and there’s a castle on one end.” 

57 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ What's that little one coming after it ? ” she 
asked. 

“ That’s a — that’s Princess Snowwhite, fleeing 
from a dragon. That’s the dragon behind her, 
with his mouth wide open. He’s going to swal- 
low her, if she doesn’t get to the castle in time.” 

It seemed doubtful whether she would. Nearer 
and nearer the frightful dragon came. We grew 
excited. “ O Lucy, Lucy ! ” cried Rosalie. “ O 

Lucy, Lucy, she’ll get swallowed ! Oh ! ” 

as the Princess slipped safely in through the open 
castle door. 

We found several other stories; and then — 
what do you think ? — we went to sleep. 

It was Kitty’s voice that roused us. “ Lazy- 
bones,” she was saying, “ this is a pretty wel- 
come.” 

“ Kitty ! ” I cried, sitting up, and rubbing my 
eyes. “ How came you back so soon ? ” 

“ On my two feet,” she answered. “And it 
isn’t so very ‘ soon ’ ; it’s after four o’clock. I 
told the teacher that I had company at home, 
and she let me off. What have you been doing 
to-day ? ” 

We told her all about it. She laughed at our 
pea-catastrophe, especially when we told her how 
Aunt Eunice cried. I did not see anything in 
58 


FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 


that to laugh at, and her lack of respect shocked 
me ; but when she saw my puzzlement she 
laughed again. 

“ What shall we do now ? ” asked Rosalie. 

“ Kitty,” I pleaded, “ I want to go over in the 
woods. Do go, will you ? ” 

“ That’s just what 1 came home for,” she re- 
plied. 

So we merrily tripped over to the woods. How 
beautiful it was in that dim, cool place, with its 
dusky shadows and with the beams of sunlight 
slanting in. There was no underbrush, and the 
trees were not crowded. The ground was glazed 
with pine needles in some places and softly car- 
peted with moss in others. How good the ever- 
greens smelled, the damp earth, and all the fine 
little plants and vines growing here, there, and 
everywhere. 

“ Keep still,” Kitty whispered all at once, stop- 
ping as she spoke. 

We listened. I could hear the breeze in the 
tree-tops, but nothing else. 

“ I thought I heard a squirrel,” said Kitty, 
moving on again. 

“ Now we are in the c green, green wood,’ aren’t 
we, Kitty ? ” I said, happily. 

c< Yes,” she answered, in a brief, inattentive 


59 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


way. “ Hark ! ” — stopping again for a moment, 
and then going on. 

“ Are there squirrels in these woods ? ” I asked. 

“ Of course. There is everything here that 
there is in any woods/’ she answered. 

“ Bears ? ” I asked. 

“No; it’s only the backwoods where there are 
bears and wild-cats.” 

“ Rabbits P ” 

“ No,” doubtfully ; “ I never heard of any. 

“ Wolves P Are there any wolves, Kitty P ” 

“ Why, no; of course not. Wolves ! What 
an idea ! But there was a fox around here last 
winter ; he stole a lot of hens, and nobody could 
catch him.” 

“ In the c Robber Kitten ’ there’s a story about 
a fox named Reynard,” I began, but she cut me 
short with a whisper : 

“There ! See ! See ! There he is ! Up on 
that bough ! Do you see him, Rosalie ? ” 

Yes, Rosalie’s sharp eyes found him ; but I was 
near-sighted, and could not see him so far away. 

“ What’s he doing ? ” I whispered. 

“ Sitting on his hind legs, eating something out 
of his fore paws,” said Rosalie, softly. 

“ ‘ Feasting on blossoms and buds,’ ” I said. 
“ What kind of buds does he eat, Kitty P ” 

60 


FINALLY, I REACH THE WOODS 


“ Squirrels don't eat buds/' said Kitty. 

“In my ‘Chimes for Childhood' there's a 
piece that says : 

‘ Come ye, come ye, to the green, green wood. 

Loudly the blackbird is singing. 

The squirrel is feasting on blossoms and buds. 

And the curling fern is springing.’ ” 

Kitty faced me with scorn. 

“ Poetry tells all sorts of perfectly absurd 
stories," she said. “ Bert had a squirrel for a pet 
once, so I ought to know." 

Unconsciously we had raised our voices and 
alarmed the squirrel, who ran off among the branch- 
es. We went quietly along, till the girls found him 
again. He chattered at us, but did not runaway. 

“ See his tail go ! " said Rosalie, laughing softly 
in her merry way. “ See his ears twitch ! Oh, 
there he goes ! Oh — my — what a jump ! Ha, 
ha, ha ! " And all the while I could not see 
him. It was very tantalizing. 

“ See, there are ripe bunchberries," said Kitty, 
pointing to clumps of scarlet berries, in a little 
opening ahead of us. 

“ Are they good to eat ? " I asked. 

“ Yes ; only they prickle your face if you're not 
careful," she replied, stooping and picking a hand- 
ful of bunches. 


61 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


We ate some, and trimmed our hats with some 
more. Then I wanted to go farther along this 
inviting path, but Kitty said no, we had gone far 
enough. 

“ It’s 'most time for me to get Charlie and go 
for Molly and the boys," she said. “And I've 
got to go for the paper, and do an errand, too, at 
the Corner. Grandma said she would send Rover 
for me when it was time, and I must stay near." 

We turned back, and pretty soon met Rover. 
Kitty would not let us go with her when she went 
for the horse ; she said that we might scare him 
and make him hard to catch. 

Aunt Eunice called us in to “ fix " for supper ; 
and it took so long to comb and curl Rosalie's 
hair that weary Time slipped away and fetched 
home Molly and the boys. 


62 



CHAPTER VI 

IN WHICH MOLLY AND THE BOYS COME 
HOME 

R OSALIE’S last button was going into its 
button-hole when we heard their voices sing- 
ing far down the road. 

“There they are! There they are!” cried 
Rosalie. And away we ran to the gate. 

Bert was driving, sitting squeezed in between 
Molly and Kitty ; and the two young men were 
on behind, with their legs hanging down. They 
were all singing : 

* Shoo, fly, don’t bodder me — 

For I belong to Company G,’ ” 

and they sent the refrain out loud and strong. 
Molly waved her hand to me, and when they 
came near enough she called : “ Hello, Lucy ! 
Hello, Lucy ! ” 


63 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


One of the young men jumped off and leaped 
toward us, flourishing his arms. It seemed as if 
he had dozens of arms, he flourished them so. 
Rosalie, with a shriek of laughter, ran away ; but 
I was so astonished and frightened that I could 
not move. When he came in front of me he 
stopped, and made a very low bow. “ How do 
you do, Miss Lucy ? ” he said. “ May I have the 
pleasure of your company ? ” And then with a 
sweep and a toss he lifted me to his shoulder. 
Molly, Kitty, and Rosalie thought it fun, and 
supposed that I was enjoying it. 

He marched with long strides to the house, and 
up the piazza steps into the kitchen, where Aunt 
Eunice and Cousin Sally were getting supper. 

“ Hello, Grandma ! ” he sang out ; “ here's a 
parcel I’ve brought you. Where shall I put it ?” 
And he professed to think that they wanted me 
placed on the stove, or the mantle-piece, or the 
middle of the supper table — he didn’t know 
which. 

Cousin Sally laughed and protested, bidding 
him stop his nonsense and behave ; and when he 
held me over the table, she cried in dismay : 
“ Dick Jones ! — you acting boy ! Don’t ! What 
are you doing ? ” 

All the while I could not utter a.sound, and it 
64 


MOLLY AND BOYS COME HOME 


seemed as if my heart went whirling like the 
wheel of a watch when the spring breaks. “ Is 
this young lady tongue-tied ? " he asked, at 
length setting me down. 

Then he seized Aunt Eunice and kissed her 
with a sounding smack, and catching Cousin Sal- 
ly round the waist, he danced her about the 
kitchen, almost bumping against the table, and 
grazing the stove. 

“Stop, stop !" cried Aunt Eunice. “ You’ll 
have the table cloth off, and break every dish on 
the table ! Do stop, Dick ! What makes you 
carry on so ? ” 

Cousin Sally boxed his ears ; whereupon he 
sat down and pretended to cry, peeping at me 
from between his fingers. I suppose I was star- 
ing with horrified amazement, for he and every- 
body else (the girls and Philip, the other young 
man, stood in the doorway now) laughed at me. 

“ Come, come ! Give us some grub ! " he 
cried. cc I’m hungry as a bear, and if I don't 
get something to eat, in two jiffs I shall make 
'way with all the kids I can lay hands on." And 
he reached out for me. 

I shrank behind Molly, and stumbled against 
Philip. He took my hand, and laughingly held 
Dick off. Then I felt safe, and gradually grew 
65 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


calmer, so that I could even enjoy Dick's non- 
sense — that is, when I was at a distance from him, 
and his jokes were directed toward the others. 

When Bert came in from putting up the horse, 
and they had all made ready for supper, we sat 
down to it. It was the noisiest meal that I had 
ever known. Molly and Dick were continually 
chaffing each other, and they used some of the 
most extraordinary expressions that I ever heard. 
For instance, Molly had considerable to say 
about a “ Hannah Cook ” ; something or other 
“ didn’t amount to a Hannah Cook,” and some- 
body or other <f didn’t know any more about it 
than a Hannah Cook.” When I asked who 
Hannah Cook was, they all laughed. Dick said 
that she was “ a peculiar party who didn’t know 
t’other from which ” ; but Molly told me that 
there was no such person. “ It’s only something 
I say when I mean that anything amounts to just 
nothing at all,” she explained. 

We had the peas for supper, and Kitty told 
about our accident. They laughed at that too. 
Dick declared that he had never eaten such 
tender peas before. It was the way they were* 
“ fixed ” that made them so tender he said. He 
had heard of dropped eggs, but never before of 
dropped peas. When his ship came in, he meant 
66 


MOLLY AND BOYS COME HOME 


to take us aboard as cooks — Hannah Cooks. 
And so this nonsensical fellow rattled on. 

Philip was a quiet young man, sober but pleas- 
ant-looking. He had a moderate way of speak- 
ing, and seemed a little shy. At least, he some- 
times blushed when Molly directed her sallies 
against him. He did not say much, but enjoyed 
the others* fun. 

Bert was quiet, too, for the most part, but he 
had fits and starts of jollity. I don’t believe he 
liked children very well ; he did not notice Rosa- 
lie and me at all. He did not seem half so boy- 
ish as Dick, although Dick was older than he. 

Cousin Sally was as gay as a girl. She joked 
and laughed with the young folks as if she were 
one of them. I was so mazed and entranced by 
all this liveliness, that I kept forgetting to eat, 
and then Dick would reach over slyly and steal 
my cake and sauce from me. 

After supper, Cousin Sally and Bert did the 
chores, Kitty went for the cow, and Molly and 
Dick washed dishes. After the dishes were 
washed Molly came out and sat on the front 
steps, and I followed her. I admired Molly very 
much, she was so pretty, merry, and good-natured. 

<c Well, Lucy,” she said, “ how do you like the 
country ? ” 


67 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Oh, I like it,” I answered with enthusiasm. 
<c It’s so green all over, and it's so still. It’s like 
living in the graveyard, only there aren’t any 
graves.” 

“ Horrors ! ” Molly exclaimed, with a start. 
cc For goodness’ sake, what put that into your 
head ? ” 

“ I mean the graveyard up by North School. 
It isn’t like other graveyards ; it’s a beautiful 
place,” I said in explanation. I could not think 
what had displeased her. Often at school when 
I should have been studying my lessons, I used 
to be gazing out on the tree-tops and the blue sky 
and the clouds over that graveyard, and wishing 
that I could be out there. I used to imagine 
that I was the little ghost of myself, playing 
among the gravestones, instead of my real self, in 
the school-room. Many a time I have watched 
that little ghost of myself jumping off the stones 
or skipping among the grass and flowers, and 
could see the white and the black stones showing 
through her as she ran. My grandfather some- 
times took me there to walk ; he liked to look 
out on the harbor and to read the quaint old in- 
scriptions. I did think it a very beautiful place. 

Molly looked into my face for a moment, and 
then she laughed. “ Well, Lucy, you’ve hit the 
68 


MOLLY AND BOYS COME HOME 


nail on the head this time,” she said; “one might 
as well be dead and buried as live in this forsaken 
place. I like to be where there are folks.” 

Just then I heard the sound that I had heard 
the evening before, and asked Molly what it was. 
“ Frogs,” she answered. They were in a pond a 
little way off, where Kitty, Rosalie, and I could 
go for flag root. 

The fog was rising again over by the woods. 
It stayed till morning, she said, and then it went 
away. She did not think there was anything 
magic about it. And she laughed again. 

By and by, Cousin Sally called Molly in and 
proposed “ a sing,” and all the others flocked to 
the sitting-room, where Aunt Eunice already sat 
reading the newspaper. She sat in the big rock- 
ing-chair with arms, and Cousin Sally took the 
one without arms. Dick tilted his chair back 
against the wall, and winked and made faces at 
me. He would pretend not to notice me for 
some time, and all at once he would look at me 
and twist his face up horribly. I could not keep 
my eyes away from him ; it made me think of 
Bloodybones and Blunderbore ; it seemed as if 
his face must be lying in wait for a chance to 
make itself up ; it was fascinating, but it was also 
very dreadful. 


69 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Molly played, and they all sang ever so many 
songs. “ Marching through Georgia/’ “Tramp, 
tramp, tramp, the boys are marching,” “ When 
Johnny comes marching home,” and “’Way 
down upon de S’wanee ribber,” were some of 
them ; and there were two that took my fancy, 
though I have forgotten them now. One of them 
was “ Old Uncle Ned.” I had never heard it 
before, and when they sang : 

“ ‘ Hang up de shubble an’ de hoe. 

Take down de fiddle an’ de bow/ ” 

and told about 

“ Old Uncle Ned, 

Who had no wool on the top of his head 
In the place where the wool ought to grow,” 

I was delighted. 

The other was either “ Mrs. Mulligan’s Ball ” 
or “ Tim Finnigan’s Wake,” I am not sure 
which ; but it was a lovely tune, and to please 
me they sang it several times over. 


70 



CHAPTER VII 

IN WHICH WE GET INTO TROUBLE 

I T was not the sun that woke me the next 
morning, but a banging sound downstairs. 
It wakened Rosalie also. 

“ What’s that ? ” I asked. 

“ I guess it’s a tin pail banging,” said Rosalie, 
rubbing her eyes. “ Mother is putting up the 
dinners.” 

“ Putting up the dinners ? ” I repeated, ques- 
tioningly. 

“ For Molly and the boys. To take to the 
shop, you know.” 

“ Oh, let’s get up and see them go ! ” I cried, 
springing out of bed. 

Rosalie was willing, so we dressed and went 
down. Philip was finishing his breakfast. Molly 
7i 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


was at the looking-glass, curling her front hair. 
Bert and Dick were outside, harnessing Charlie. 
Cousin Sally was busy with some tin pails and a 
lot of food, and she had her hat on. 

“ Are you going, too, Cousin Sally ? " I asked, 
walking up to where she was at work and resting 
my arms on the table. 

“ Of course," she answered, curtly. Then she 
added in an apologetic tone, “ I have a raging 
headache, and it makes me cross. I don't half 
know what I’m about; I've given Phil all the 
pie, and I haven't put a bit of cake into your 
pail, Molly." 

“ Never mind," said Molly. “ I guess I can 
worry along without cake one day, and Phil 
sha’n't have all that pie, if you did give it to 
him. There " — with a last glance in the mirror — 
“ I won't struggle any longer ; it’s no use to ex- 
pect frizzles to flourish in a fog." 

At that I looked out of doors for the first 
time, and saw that it was a damp, cloudy morn- 
ing, that the team was ready and the boys were 
waiting. 

“Come, Molly," called Dick, “stop your 
primping. Phil, you slow-poke, hurry up your 
cakes. And, for pity's sake, don't wait to crimp 
your mustache." 


72 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


They crowded into the buggy, as they had the 
night before. Rosalie and I stood at the gate 
and watched them drive away. Dick threw kisses 
at us till they were out of sight. 

“Wouldn’t it be nice,” I said, “if they had a 
magic carpet, and all they had to do was sit down 
on it and wish they were at the Corn-shop, and 
they’d be there ? Then your mother wouldn’t 
have to go.” 

“ Nobody ever had such a thing,” she returned, 
scornfully. 

“ Yes, they did, too ; Prince — I forget his 
name — had one. It’s in a story in the ‘Arabian 
Nights.’” 

“ I don’t believe it,” said Rosalie. 

“ I’d like to have one,” she said, after a pause. 
“ Was it a whole carpet? Wouldn’t it look funny 
flying through the air?” And she laughed. 

“ I think I should rather ride in a horse and 
carriage, though,” I said ; “ you can’t ride in a 
horse and carriage every day.” 

“You can’t ride on a magic carpet every day, 
either,” she replied. 

“ But you can make b’lieve you can,” I re- 
joined. 

“ How can you ? ” 

“ You can sit down on a carpet, cross-leg, the 
73 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


way the Turks do, and shut your eyes, and make 
b'lieve hard, and you can seem to be going.” 

“ Can't you sit in the buggy when it’s in the 
barn and make b'lieve be going ? ” 

“No, I can't,” I answered; “that's real, and 
you have to have your eyes open.” 

“ I can,” said she. 

“Your make-b'lieve isn't like my make- 
b’lieve,” I replied; “you only pertend.” 

“ I don’t pertend,” she retorted. 

“Yes, you do, too,” I declared. 

“ Children, stop quarrelling, and come and eat 
your breakfast,” Kitty called from the doorway. 

We started to run, but Rosalie, determined to 
have the last word, said as we went : “ Molly and 
the boys can ride in a horse and carriage every 
day ; so there, now.” 

It was on that day, after breakfast, that we 
hurt Rover. I never shall forget it. You re- 
member, I told you about Rover's sore back ? 
Well, we were swinging in the barn, Kitty, Rosa- 
lie, and I (I was in the swing, and Kitty was push- 
ing), when Rover got in my way, and the corner 
of the swing-board struck the sore place. Poor 
Rover ! He howled with pain and snarled and 
showed his teeth. I don't believe he really 
meant to hurt me, but he looked so enraged that 
74 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


I was frightened. Indeed, we were all frightened 
out of our senses. I mean that, “ out of our 
senses,” because if we had been sensible we 
should have stayed there and shown Rover that 
we didn’t intend to hurt him and were sorry for 
his suffering ; but instead of that we took to our 
heels. 

We rushed out of the barn, across the yard, up 
the steps, into the entry, and shut the door in 
Rover’s very face. We were trembling with fear, 
all of us, and Rover’s crying made us cry, too. 
Aunt Eunice must have been upstairs making 
the beds, for she did not come to see what the 
matter was. 

We stood there crying with him for several 
minutes, not daring to open the door, until at 
length an idea seized Kitty, and she went and 
fetched the sugar-bowl. Then she opened the 
door a crack. 

“ Good Rover ! Poor Rover ! ” she said, coax- 
ingly. (( We didn’t mean to, Rover. I’m so 
sorry, Rover. Dear Rover ! ” 

If Rover had been angry enough to hurt us 
(I can’t decide whether he was or not), he got 
over his rage quickly, for he let us come out and 
pat and caress him, and he ate sugar from our 
hands. I suppose Prince was there and had some 
75 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


sugar, too, but I don’t remember about Prince. 
We carried the sugar-bowl to the barn, and left it 
there when Kitty went to school. 

After Kitty had gone, Rosalie and I thought 
that we would make raspberry jelly. 

We picked two burdock leaves by the wayside, 
and puckering them up with our left hands, filled 
them with our right. We carried the berries to 
the barn-chamber, put them in a little tin pail, 
mashed them, and poured the juice off into the 
bronze pitchers. This brought us to a standstill. 

“ You have to have sugar for jelly,” I said. 

Now, one would think that we would have re- 
membered the sugar-bowl downstairs, but we did 
not. Instead, we went to Cousin Sally, who had 
returned, and asked her to let us have some sugar 
to make jelly. 

Cousin Sally’s headache must have been raging 
harder than ever, for she was testy and would not 
give us a bit. We went out disconsolately and 
sat down on the piazza. 

u We can’t make jelly without sugar,” I said. 

“ Sometimes she gets over it,” said Rosalie. 

“ I wish,” she went on, “ that Kitty had stayed 
home to-day ; Kitty knows how to talk her ’round.” 
She did not say this disrespectfully, nor did I think 
of it as a disrespectful speech. It was a fact that 
76 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


Cousin Sally could be persuaded, and that Kitty 
could be very persuasive. 

44 What do you s’pose Kitty would say ? ” I 
asked. 

44 She would go in and get the sugar out of the 
firkin, and then she’d say, 4 Mother, I’ve taken 
some sugar for Rosalie to make jelly with.’ And 
then mother would say, c You put that sugar right 
back ; I can’t afford to waste sugar on children.’ 
And Kitty would look awful sorry, and go back 
like this ” — (here Rosalie sprang up and crossed 
the piazza in a mournful, unwilling way). 44 And 
when she got to the firkin she’d say, 4 Mother, if 
I put half back, won’t that do ? ’ And mother 
would say, 4 No ; and for mercy’s sake don’t stay 
here bothering me. I’m just ready to jump; 
everything needs to be done first, and I don’t 
know which to begin on.’ And then Kitty would 
say, 4 I’ll help you a lot, mother, if you’ll let 
Rosalie have the sugar.’ And mother would 
say : 4 Well, she may have it this time, but this 
is the very last time I shall let that child have 
sugar.’ ” 

44 Why don’t you do that way ? ” I asked. 

44 They won’t let me work ; they always tell 
me I’m in the way. Besides, I should laugh if I 
pertended ; I always laugh when I pertend.” 

77 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ You said you never did pertend,” said I. 

“ I don’t pertend ! ” cried Rosalie ; and she 
flew at me and thumped me against the wall. 

“ Children, children ! ” exclaimed Cousin Sally, 
hastening to the door, “ what are you doing P 
You’ll drive me distracted ! What is the trou- 
ble ? ” 

“We want some sugar to make jelly,” said 
Rosalie, quickly. 

Her mother smiled, in spite of the headache. 
“ That’s a queer reason for beating Lucy,” she 
said. “You can’t have any. I can’t afford to 
keep letting you have sugar to play with. But if 
you will be good and not tease, I will take you 
up to Mr. Low’s this afternoon. I’m going up 
to see about some hay. Remember, now, I sha’n’t 
take you unless you are good.” 

“ Where does Mr. Low live P ” I asked Rosa- 
lie, as we skipped out to the barn. 

“ Up to Duck-Pond,” she answered. 

“ Duck-Pond ! ” I exclaimed. “ Oh, yes ; I 
forgot all about Duck-Pond. I’m so glad ! I 
want to see it. Is it Mr. Low’s ? ” 

You remember that in one of the “ Lucy 
Books ” it tells about a little duck-pond and 
house that Royal made for Lucy to keep a pet 
duck inP I had a notion that this Duck-Pond, 
78 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


of which I had so often heard, must be such a 
one as Lucy’s. 

“ I don’t know,” said Rosalie ; “ I guess it’s 
Mr. Low’s though.” 

“ Is there a house, too ? ” I asked. 

“ Lots of them,” said Rosalie. 

“ Why, how many ducks are there ? ” I asked. 

But she made me no answer, for just then one 
of the hens began to shrill forth “ K-a-r-r-r-r-e ! ” 
and looking up we saw a large bird in the air. 

“ Mother ! Mother ! ” Rosalie screamed. 
cc There’s a hawk after the chickens ! ” 

Her mother came hurrying to the door, and 
looked. 

It was a dark bird and it flew swiftly. All the 
chickens chirred and ran in a panic to their 
mothers. 

The hawk flew quite near, circling, and beating 
his wings in a peculiar way ; then soared again, 
up, up, looking smaller and smaller upon the gray 
sky, till I could not see him. 

Cousin Sally told us to sit down in the barn 
and watch, and if the hawk came again to 
frighten him off. She was so anxious that she 
kept coming out to look herself. But the hawk 
did not come back ; perhaps, she said, he had 
found a meal somewhere else. 


79 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


We kept on the watch, running and playing 
about the yard, until a sudden shower drove us 
into the barn. Still we watched, although, as 
Rosalie said, it wasn’t likely that he would come 
in the rain ; besides, the chickens were safe 
under their mothers’ feathers. After the shower 
the sun shone brightly, and the chickens came 
out and shook themselves, stood on one leg, 
winked with one eye, preened and pecked and 
peeped, and did so many cunning things that we 
forgot the hawk. 

Something else that I thought very curious 
took up our attention, also ; the ground seemed 
to be covered with tiny hop-toads, little bits of 
ones, thousands of them, merrily hopping every- 
where. Rosalie said that they rained down. She 
and Kitty had seen them before, after a shower. 
We thought it strange that we had not noticed 
them falling in the rain. We took them in our 
hands ; we set them on our finger-tips and let 
them hop off. Some of them were so tiny that 
we could not handle them. 

I thought that I should like to take some of 
them home to Bobby ; so we got the little tin 
pail that we had mashed our raspberries in, and 
undertook to fill it with hop-toads. But they 
would not stay in it ; while we were catching 
80 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


numbers three and four, numbers one and two 
would take a mean advantage of us and hop out. 

All at once Cousin Sally came through the 
barn, and she called to us angrily to come into 
the house with her. She held the sugar-bowl in 
one hand. 

“You naughty, naughty children ! ” she cried, 
before we were fairly in the kitchen. “ You have 
disobeyed me, and wasted a lot of sugar. Lucy, 
you are older than Rosalie, so you are the most 
to blame. What did you do such a naughty 
thing for ? ” 

Neither of us knew what to say, we were so 
taken by surprise and so unconscious of having 
done wrong; we stood in silent bewilderment, 
looking at her and at the sugar-bowl. 

“ Why don’t you speak ? ” she said. 

“ We didn’t,” said Rosalie. 

“ Didn’t what ? ” asked her mother. 

“ I don’t know,” said Rosalie. 

“Took the sugar-bowl out to the barn and 
helped yourselves to sugar. Now, whose idea 
was that ? ” 

“We didn’t take it,” I said. 

“ Didn’t take it ? ” cried Cousin Sally. “ Don’t 
add to your naughtiness by telling wrong stories. 
Here is the sugar-bowl ; I found it in the barn 
81 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


where you were playing, and more than half the 
sugar is gone.” 

u We didn't take it,” said Rosalie. 

“ Why, Rosalie Reed ! ” exclaimed her mother. 
“ How can you stand there and tell me fibs ? ” 

“ It isn’t a fib,” said I. “ We didn’t take it. 
Kitty took it. She took it ” 

But Cousin Sally interrupted : 

“ Kitty wasn’t here. You are two naughty, 
naughty girls. 1 should think you would be 
ashamed, a great, big girl like you, Lucy, to set 
Rosalie such an example. Now, I am going to 
punish you, by not taking you up to Mr. Low’s.” 

Rosalie flung herself down on the floor, and 
cried loudly. I stood in silent grief and dismay. 

“ K-a-r-r-r-r-e ! ” suddenly rose the shrill, dis- 
tressful cry of the hens, and the chickens chirred 
in fright. Cousin Sally hurried out to the yard. 
Rosalie stopped crying and raised herself to 
listen ; then she jumped up and ran to the door. 
“ Oh, Lucy,” she cried, “ the hawk has caught 
a chicken ! ” 

Aunt Eunice went to the door to look, but I 
did not stir. I did not care if the hawk had a 
hundred chickens ; I wanted to go home to my 
mother. 

“ Lucy,” said Rosalie, coming to me after the 
82 


WE GET INTO TROUBLE 


hawk had disappeared, “ never mind if mother 
did scold ; she will take us up to Mr. Low’s — 
you see if she doesn’t.” 

I did not respond ; I felt that I did not want 
to go up to Mr. Low’s. 

“ Now, Lucy, don’t be sulky,” said Aunt 
Eunice. “ You were naughty and deserved the 
scolding. And why didn’t you tell the truth ? ” 

“ I did tell the truth,” I returned. 

“ So did I,” said Rosalie. “ We didn’t take 
the sugar-bowl, Grandma ; Kitty took it. She 
took it for Rover, because the swing-board hurt 
him. He ate a lot, and it cured him. She did, 
Grandma.” 

<c When ? ” asked Aunt Eunice. 

“ Before she went to school,” Rosalie answered. 

“ Well, why didn’t you say so ? ” said Aunt 
Eunice. Then, after a moment’s pause, she con- 
tinued : “ Lucy, Sally is tired and half-sick to- 
day, and it makes her sharp, and now that she 
has lost a chicken, she will be more unreasonable 
than ever ; so you children take yourselves out 
through the shed to the barn-chamber, and stay 
till dinner-time. I’ll tell her about it, and she 
will be herself when she has time to think. Here, 
I am going to give you each a half-cup of sugar. 
Now, run.” 


83 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


She handed us each a cup. I held mine an in- 
stant ; then I put it on the table, and ran away to 
the barn as fast as 1 could go. 

Rosalie followed me. “ Never mind,” she 
said, cheerfully. “ Mother’ll get over it; she al- 
ways does. She will take us up to Mr. Low’s, 
and we shall have a splendid time. Come, let’s 
make jelly. I’ll give you half of my sugar.” 

I did not want to make jelly ; I was sorely un- 
happy ; but Rosalie’s coaxing at length won the 
day, and we went on with our jelly-making. 


84 



CHAPTER VIII 

IN WHICH I AM STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 

B OTH Cousin Sally and I “ got over it,” and 
dinner passed as pleasantly as if nothing 
unpleasant had happened. After dinner, she 
curled Rosalie's hair, and we had on clean pink 
gingham* frocks. Then she harnessed Charlie, 
and we set out for Mr. Low's. 

Cousin Sally was very jolly, but she was fidgety. 
She fretted because the flies bothered Charlie, and 
kept him whisking his tail over the reins ; be- 
cause she hadn't cleaned every speck of mud ofl 
the left hind wheel, and one unsightly daub of it 
haunted her eye ; because Rosalie didn't sit still ; 
because I sat so still ; because Charlie wanted to 
go fast, and might sweat if he did ; and because 
some heavy clouds were threatening a shower, and 
she feared that we should not get there before it 
rained. Between the frets she joked and laughed 
a good deal. It seemed almost no time at all 
before we came to Mr. Low's. 

85 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Mr. Low’s house was old-fashioned, and had 
a number of large elm-trees in front of it. We 
could see into the barn, which was full of new 
hay ; and a loaded hay-rack stood there. A tall, 
spare man was crossing the dooryard. 

“ There’s Mr. Low ! ” cried Rosalie. “ Hello, 
Mr. Low ! You don’t know what we came for, 
Mr. Low.” 

“ You came to see me, didn’t you, Posy ? ” he 
said, coming up to her side of the buggy, and 
tweaking one of her curls. 

“ No,” said Rosalie, “ we didn’t come for that ; 
we came for something else.” « 

“ What did you come for, hey ? ” he asked, 
lifting her to the ground as she was preparing to 
climb down herself. 

“ Yes,” said Rosalie, “ that’s what we came for 
— hay. How did you know, Mr. Low ? ” 

Mr. Low and Cousin Sally laughed. Then he 
helped Cousin Sally out, and then me. 

“ Who is this little girl ? ” he asked, smiling at 
me in a friendly way. And when Cousin Sally 
told him about me, he asked me how I liked being 
in the country. 

“ I like it,” I answered. “ It is next best to 
going to sea.” 

“ So you’ve been to sea, have you ? ” he said. 

86 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


"No,” said I, “ I never went to sea, but I’m 
going when I grow up.” 

He and Cousin Sally laughed again ; and then 
we saw Mrs. Low at the door. She was very glad 
to see us. We went into the house with her, and 
sat down in her cool, shady sitting-room. 

Cousin Sally asked Mr. Low if he could let her 
have some hay, and, after they had made their 
arrangements about it, he went off to his work. 
But, before going, he said that he had gotten in 
his last load of hay that morning, just in time to 
escape the shower ; and he was going to take it 
over to somebody-or-other's — I don't remember 
the name — that afternoon. (Mrs. Low told us 
afterward, that this somebody-or-other, being 
laid up with some kind of sickness — I don't re- 
member what — was short of hay, and wouldn't 
have any crops, to speak of ; so his neighbors, of 
whom Mr. Low was one, had agreed among them- 
selves to look out for him this year, and Mr. Low’s 
contribution was to be hay.) He was going in 
about half an hour, he said ; and didn’t the little 
folks want to take a “ see-v oyage ” on the load ? 

Of course we wanted to, and, of course, Cousin 
Sally said yes ; so, after finding that I could read 
the clock, and bidding me watch it and come out 
at such-a-time, he went away. 

87 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


How Mrs. Low and Cousin Sally did talk — of 
everybody and of everything that had happened 
at Duck-Pond or Pride’s Corner for months. 
Somebody had died, and Mrs. Low told all about 
the funeral ; somebody had married, and Cousin 
Sally knew all about that ; somebody had a new 
baby ; somebody had a new horse ; somebody 
had quarrelled with somebody else ; and somebody 
had gone on a visit, and had some new dresses be- 
fore she went. Each dress was described, down to 
the very buttons. Then Mrs. Low asked : “ Is 
Molly going to the dance ? ” 

Cousin Sally said, yes, that she herself was 
going to drive Molly down and wait to fetch her 
home, and that Molly was making a blue cambric 
dress to wear. Mrs. Low said that Emma Ellen 
was going, too, and also had a new dress ; and 
then she got the dress for us to see — a light cam- 
bric figured with tiny deer’s heads, made with a 
polonaise and ever so many ruffles. 

“ Why doesn’t Emma Ellen come over ? ” 
Cousin Sally asked. “ We haven’t seen her for 
a long while.” 

<c She has been talking about it, but there, 
we’ve been so drove, through haying, and we’ve 
been putting up strawberries, too,” answered 
Mrs. Low. “ I want you to taste my jam,” she 
88 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


continued ; and she went and got a piece of cake 
and a saucer of jam for Cousin Sally, and two 
slices of bread spread thick with it for Rosalie 
and me. 

“ I want to know,” she said, cc if you are going 
to the raspberrying next week ? Emma Ellen is, 
and Eve about made up my mind to go along, 
too.” 

“Going? Of course Em going,” Cousin Sally 
answered. “ I wouldn’t miss it for anything. 
Kitty and I are going, and Molly would like to 
if she could. Why, everybody will be there. 
You must go.” 

Then they launched into detail — which is a 
grown-up way of saying that they said every lit- 
tle, trivial thing they could think of about it : 
in what field and part of the field they believed 
the berries would be thickest, what kind of 
weather they hoped and looked for, who they 
thought would probably be there, what they 
should wear, what they should take for lunch, 
what they should carry to get the berries in, etc., 
etc. I sat eating my nice bread-and-jam and 
drinking in delicious expectation ; for although 
Cousin Sally said nothing about our going, Rosa- 
lie and I took it for granted. 

At such-a-time we went out to the barn. Mr. 
89 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Low was ready to start, and he put us on top of 
the load. At first I felt afraid, for being so high 
up was a new experience to me ; but it was also 
an enjoyable experience, and as we rolled slowly 
and creakingly along I gazed about on fields, 
woods, and clouds with delighted eyes. The 
great clouds made great shadows, that moved 
across the bright landscape as slowly as we were 
moving. Everything was fresh and richly green 
and sunnily pleasant-looking. 

We were not alone on top of the hay, for a big 
boy rode with us. He was not much of a com- 
panion ; he lay flat on his stomach, resting on his 
elbows, and whistled or chewed hay all the time. 
Mr. Low walked, first beside the horses, then be- 
side the hay-rack, and now and then he talked to 
us as we went along. 

“ They have some bees down there,” he said. 
“ Did you ever see any bees ? ” 

“ Oh, yes, sir,” we both answered ; and I said, 
“ I’ve seen bees in our garden at home. There 
are lots of bees there all the time, getting honey.” 

“ So have I,” said Rosalie. “ I’ve seen bees 
getting honey, too.” 

“ Of course you have. 1 mean, have you ever 
seen bees making honey ? ” 

“ No, sir,” we both answered; and I said 


90 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


<c I’ve seen the honey after it’s made, all in the 
honey-comb. I had some once.” 

“ Did you ? ” said he. “ And was it good ? ” 

“ Yes, sir; and it was pretty, too. It was the 
beautifulest thing I ever saw — to eat,” I said. 
“ It was when we lived in Eastport, when I was 
a little teenie-tonty girl. My father brought 
home a whole, great big platterful. Oh, it was 
a great big platter, piled ’way up high. And it 
was yellowy, and the honey kept dripping out 
till it ran over, and my mother had to turn it 
off into a dish. And we ate it all up for supper. 
Oh, I love honey-comb ! ” 

I don’t believe that Mr. Low heard much of 
my story, for the cart was making a good deal of 
noise, and I was far up above him ; but the boy 
on the hay heard it, and he made a sound of de- 
rision, half laugh, half hoot. 

“ Hur ! I guess you did, a lot ! ” he said. 
“ You’d ’a been sick as sick — all that sweet stuff 
to one meal.” 

“ We did,” I said, stoutly. 1 did not like to 
have my exaggerations flatly contradicted. But 
the boy was firm. “You couldn’t have,” he 
returned. “You needn’t think we’re going to 
swaller that great story.” So I gave in and ad- 
mitted that 1 was not certain. “ I think we ate 


9i 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


it all up for supper; I don’t remember any 
more about it,” I said. “ I only remember about 
it, I don’t remember any more about it.” 

“ Never mind,” said Mr. Low, “ it isn’t worth 
quarrelling over. You’ll see the bees at work, 
and a curious sight they are. But you must look 
out and not get stung.” 

When we arrived at the place, the boy slid 
down, and Mr. Low climbed up and lifted Ro- 
salie and me to the ground. He pointed out the 
hives, under some trees a little way off, telling us 
to go there and watch the bees while he and the 
boy unloaded the hay. There were twelve hives, 
on benches ; the bees were flying to and from 
them very busily, and the air was full of murmur. 

At first we were afraid of getting stung, there 
seemed so very many bees going and coming, but 
gradually we grew bolder and went near enough 
to see into the glass windows. If we had had 
somebody to explain their work to us, we might 
have learned a good deal about them ; but we 
were only little girls, not used to acquiring useful 
information. Indeed, instead of acquiring useful 
information, I was rather given to imparting use- 
less information. cc Bees,” I told Rosalie, “have 
a queen, like the fairies.” 

“ No, they don’t,” she contradicted. 


92 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


“They do, too,” I insisted. “I know apiece 
of poetry that says, £ The Queen Bee sits on her 
amber throne.’ ” 

“ Amber ? What is amber ? ” Rosalie asked. 

“ It is hardened honey,” I answered. “ I saw 
a necklace made of amber, once ; it was beads, 
like your coral beads, only amber instead of coral, 
— pale yellowy, you know, instead of pink. They 
were carved out of hardened honey.” 

“ My cherry-stone beads are carved,” said 
Rosalie. “ Dick carved them for me, with a 
knife.” 

“ If you should get some honey and keep it 
till it hardens, you could get him to carve you an 
amber necklace,” I said. 

Rosalie began to dance, and sing, “I’m going 
to ! Pm going to ! ” and so doing, she got in the 
way of a big bee. He bumped against but did 
not sting her, and then flew directly into my 
face. 

Were you ever stung by a bee? If not, try to 
imagine that five thousand mosquitoes are nip- 
ping you, all in the same spot, and you will 
understand why I gave a screech that brought 
everybody running. There were Mr. Low and 
the boy and a young lady and an old lady and a 
middle-aged lady. 


93 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


I do not recall exactly what happened then, 
but somebody laughed, somebody said : “ Poor 
child ! ” and somebody else said that I must go 
right up to the house and have brown paper put 
on the bite. Then Mr. Low picked me up, and 
carried me to the farmhouse kitchen. 

The three ladies put wet brown paper on the 
swelled place, and asked Rosalie and me ques- 
tions. They asked how old I was, what my 
name was, where I lived, who my father and 
mother were, whether I had ever been in the 
country before, what I thought of the country, 
how long I was going to stay, if Mrs. Low and 
Cousin Sally were going to the circle, if Molly 
and Emma Ellen were going to the dance, 
whether Molly had a new dress, whether Emma 
Ellen had a new dress, whether the new dresses 
were made with polonaises, and how many loops 
there were in the back. This last question 
neither of us could answer satisfactorily, and the 
ladies answered it themselves, by deciding that 
Molly and Emma Ellen would be likely to have 
“ all the style they could pile on,” and so must 
have at least six loops in their polonaises. 

And were our folks going to the raspberrying ? 
they asked. We were able to inform them as 
to all of Mrs. Low’s and Cousin Sally’s plans. 

94 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


The middle-aged lady and the young lady said 
that they were going, but the old lady said that 
her raspberrying days were over. 

Then they gave us each a small piece of honey- 
comb to eat. Rosalie asked if they would lend 
her the saucer, as she wanted to take her honey 
home and save it to make beads. Of course 
they exclaimed, and we had to tell them what we 
meant. The young lady said that we were mis- 
taken ; amber was not made from honey ; it was 
something that came from a whale. I hardly 
believed this ; but I said nothing, and ate my 
honey-comb. Then they kissed us, said that we 
were nice little girls, and asked us to come again. 
“ I’ll take some honey-comb to the raspberrying 
for you,” said the middle-aged lady — whose 
name, I afterward found out from Cousin Sally, 
was Sarah Googins. The old lady was “ Aunt 
Jane,” and the young lady was “ Mealy ” (short 
for Amelia), but I don’t know whether they were 
Googinses or not. 

On the way back the boy sang a song about 
me, a hateful, teasing song : 

‘“How doth the little busy bee 
Improve each shining hour ? * 

He stings the silly little girls. 

And makes them yell and holler.” 


95 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


I was so angry that I would not look at him ; 
and when, on parting, he cried, “ Good-by, 
Silly! I’ll see you again at the rosb’r’ing,” I 
tasted a sudden bitter flavor in my cup of joyful 
anticipation. 

Mrs. Low was very sympathetic about my 
sting, and got out a bottle, labelled “ Balm Of A 
Thousand Flowers/’ to bathe my cheek. “ Balm 
Of A Thousand Flowers ! ” How romantic that 
sounded ! It made me almost glad that I had 
been stung. 

When we left Mr. Low’s, I said : “ Cousin 
Sally, I haven’t seen the duck-pond. Where is 
it ? ” 

“ Where is it ? ” she repeated. “ Why, this is 
it. This is Duck-Pond.” And she gave a wave 
of her hand that swept in the whole visible world. 

I looked in every direction, but saw only dry 
land. “ Where ? ” I asked. 

<c Here, everywhere,” she answered, and in her 
voice was a note of impatience. I said nothing 
more, but my disappointment and wonder were 
great. There is a Duck-Pond. It is not a lit- 
tle play one, either ; it is a large, beautiful sheet 
of water. But all the country round about it 
is called Duck Pond, also. I don’t see why 
Cousin Sally did not explain this to me. Prob- 
96 


STUNG BY A DUCK-POND BEE 


ably she would if I had pressed the question ; 
perhaps she would even have taken pains to show 
me the pond, if she had known how very much 
I wished to see it. But I did not say any more 
about it, and never saw it till I was grown up. 

All the way home Cousin Sally saluted every' 
one within hailing distance, and “ Are your folks 
going to the raspberrying? ” was the question 
that she asked of each. She called to Mr. 
Woodman in the hay-field, and to Mr. Little in 
the barn ; and Mrs. Baker came up from hgr 
blueberry pasture to talk it over. Most of the 
women were going. It was confidently expected 
to be a great success. 


97 



CHAPTER IX 

IN WHICH WE GO FOR THE COW 

K ITTY, Rosalie, and I had supper early, be- 
fore Molly and the boys got home, for we 
were all going after Fanny that night. Cousin 
Sally pastured her cow in Mr. Jensen’s pasture, 
paying him for the privilege, of course. Mr. 
Jensen was her next neighbor up the road. 

As we went along we told Kitty about the 
honey, and I asked] [her if amber was hardened 
honey, or if it was something that came from a 
whale. She answered that it wasn’t either ; she 
said that amber was the juice of a rock. “Not 
common rocks, such as we have around here,” 
she said, “ but a certain kind of rock that is 
found in foreign lands. This juice, which is a 
sort of yellow water, oozes out, drop by drop, 
and hardens, and that’s amber. I read a piece in 
a book once that called it £ tears ’ ; that means, 
you know, that it weeps out of the rock, the way 
tears do out of us. 


98 



WE GO FOR THE COW 


cc Or else, it's a tree,” she added after a mo- 
ment’s reconsideration. “ Come to think, I be- 
lieve it’s a tree; but I know that the amber is 
something that oozes out like tears and hardens.” 

This theory was so much more romantic than 
the others that I believed it at once. 

Soon we came to the bars, and while Kitty was 
putting them up behind us Rosalie spied some 
blueberries ; so, forgetting the cow, we began to 
pick and eat. They picked and ate one at a 
time, but I liked better to fill my palm and then 
sit down on the grass and eat at leisure. Just as 
I had settled down to enjoyment, a loud, harsh 
voice suddenly jarred upon us, startling me so 
that I dropped every berry I had picked. 

“ Here you there ! ” it cried. “ What you a 
doin’ of? What you a pickin’ my blueb’ries 
for ? Hain’t you got a blueb’ry pastur o’ your 
own? Why don’t you stay to hum an’ pick your 
own blueb’ries, ’stead o’ cornin’ over here an’ 
stealin’ other folkses? You go hum, now, quick !” 

Theres across the field, stood Mr. Jensen in his 
doorway. He was an old man, and looked un- 
kempt and cross. 

The word <c stealing ” angered Kitty, and Kitty, 
I must confess, was apt to be saucy when she was 
angry. She answered saucily now : 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ I sha’n’t go home, either. We’ve got a right 
to go through, to get our cow. Doesn't my 
mother pay you for it? ” 

“ She don’t pay me for the right to pick my 
blueb’ries. What’d your mother think if we 
went over in her pastur aberryin’ ? You clear 
out, now, or I’ll set my dog on ye.” 

“Oh, will he?” I said in terror; but Kitty an- 
swered, scornfully : “ No ; and I don’t care if he 
does. That old dog hasn’t a tooth in his head, 
and he likes me better than he does the whole 
caboodle of Jensens. But come on. We won’t 
touch any more of his blueb'ries . There’s Fan- 
nie’s bell.” 

We heard the cow in the bushes over by the 
woods, and there we went, wading through dewy 
grass and clumps of lambkill and everlasting. It 
was twilight, and the west was splendidly red. 
Overhead a large, bright star was coming out. 
It stood directly above the point of a tall fir, and 
it made me think of a picture that I had seen of 
a Christmas-tree topped with a golden star. The 
round moon hung over the woods, nearly oppo- 
site the red west, and looked silvery against the 
rose and azure sky. 

“ Co’, co’ ! Co’, co’ ! ” Kitty called, but 
Fannie’s bell and moo sounded farther away. 


ioo 


WE GO FOR THE COW 


“ She must have gone into the woods,” said 
Kitty. “ I never saw that cow's equal for junket- 
ing off just as you get to her. Rosalie, you run 
over by the sumach, and stand ready to head her 
off if she comes that way ; and Lucy, you stand 
over by that clump of hardhack, and don’t let her 
go by you. I’ll creep in and stop Miss Fannie’s 
woodland stroll.” 

I obediently went over to the hardhack and 
stood, but oh, I was afraid ! What could I do 
with a great cow, if she chose to come my way ? 
Kitty disappeared in the dusky wood, and I lost 
sight of even Rosalie, although her post was not 
far away, for, as I told you once before, I was 
near-sighted. As I stood there alone in the 
gathering gloom, and waited for the cow to come 
thundering down upon me, I was fairly sick with 
fear. The shadows seemed full of Shapes. A 
whippoorwill called from the wood, again and 
again ; his note was new to me, and to my excited 
fancy seemed the voice of a Being. I grew cold 
and trembly. Then, when I had worked myself 
into such a state that I felt as if I must either 
die or run away, Fannie came galloping out of 
the trees, straight in my direction, mooing with 
all her might ; and in a frenzy I jumped up and 
down, screaming, “ Boo ! Boo ! ” 


IOI 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Probably as frightened as I was, Fannie bound- 
ed away in the right direction. Kitty and Rosalie 
came forth laughing. 

“Well done, Lucy !” Kitty cried. “I didn’t 
believe you had it in you c to say cc boo ” to a 
goose,’ let alone a cow.” And Rosalie broke into 
one of her peals of merriment, which made the 
echoes ring. 

It was slow work driving Fannie home, she was 
so determined to sample every kind of green stuff 
that she came across. She kept turning her head 
as if to look at us ; though Kitty said, she was 
“ seeing the moon over her left shoulder. And 
that means,” said Kitty, cc that she’ll be contrarier 
than ever till the moon fulls again.” Every once 
in a while she would stop short, and turn to 
one side, like Balaam’s ass — though, to be sure, 
Balaam’s ass did have good reason to turn aside, 
and Fannie didn’t. Ten chances to one, she 
would plunge into the bushes, and we would 
have to plunge in after her and head her off. 
Then she would swing along again, lashing her 
tail and chewing, until she had a fresh temptation 
to browse or act contrary. 

It was exciting to me, despite the slowness of 
it, that merry business of driving home the cow. 
I was happy in my mind in a still sort of way 


102 


WE GO FOR THE COW 


also. In all my dreams of the Country, I had 
never imagined anything like this : to be follow- 
ing that tinkling bell through the moonlight, amid 
dewiness and sweet wild odors ; not able to distin- 
guish any object that was not directly in the light, 
and yet to feel sure that it was all beautiful. “ It 
doesn’t seem true, does it, Kitty ? ” I said. 

cc When you’ve chased Fannie as many years as 
I have, you’ll think it seems true enough,” she 
returned. “ I’d like to have a dollar for every 
mile out of the way that cow has made me tramp.” 

When we reached home we found Molly and 
the boys there. Molly was helping her mother 
and grandmother put up raspberries. The boys 
were playing ball in the moonlighted yard. 
Rosalie and I went and stood in the barn door- 
way to watch them. 

This was the worst stand that we could have 
taken, for here we were directly in range of the 
ball. Pretty soon it did come flying our way, and 
hit me in the cheek, under my eye — not the cheek 
that the bee stung, but the other one. It knocked 
me down, and for a minute or two I was half 
senseless ; it was Rosalie who screamed. 

Bert was angry. Maybe he was frightened; 
some people are angry when they are frightened. 
We will give him the benefit of the doubt. He 
103 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


said that it served me right ; that I had no busi- 
ness to be in the way. Everybody else was more 
feeling about it. Philip carried me into the house ; 
Aunt Eunice put wet brown paper on the bruised 
place ; Molly tucked a sugared raspberry in my 
mouth, and patted me soothingly ; while Cousin 
Sally kept exclaiming : “ What will she look like ? 
What a fright she will be ! What will her mother 
say? Why did you stand there? Why didn’t 
you boys send them away ? If it had been Rosa- 
lie it would have hit higher up — on her temple, 
perhaps — and might have killed her. Oh, dear, it 
hasn’t broken her cheek-bone, has it ? You don’t 
suppose it will injure her eye, do you ? Don’t 
cry, Lucy, don’t cry ; you’ll be all right, pretty 
soon.” 

When the vim of the pain was over, and I 
stopped crying, Dick began to “ train,” as Molly 
called it — that is, he said and did all the ridiculous, 
nonsensical things that he could think of ; and 
Cousin Sally and the girls went into spasms of 
mirth over his antics. The others laughed, too, in 
their quieter way, but I was so taken up with my 
feelings that I did not pay much attention to him ; 
until, when Rosalie asked : “ Why don’t you 
laugh, Lucy ? ” he said : “ What can you expect 
of anyone who has been banged by a base-ball, bit- 
104 






WE GO FOR THE COW 


ten by a bee, and bathed with c Balm Of A Billion 
Blooms * ? ” Then I came to myself enough to 
dispute him : “ It wasn’t £ Balm Of A Billion 
Blooms it was c Balm Of A Thousand Flowers.’ ” 
“ Oh, well, I guess you’ll live through it,” said 
he, “ if you’ve got so as to be particular about 
the name of the stuff you were bathed with.” 

“ Ladies and gentlemen,” he went on, “ I will 
now exhibit my joy over our young friend’s resto- 
ration to health.” And with that, he did an as- 
tonishing thing : chair and all he turned a com- 
plete somersault, and came up making faces at me. 
And while I sat spellbound, watching his hideous 
grimaces, he suddenly gave a yell like a war- 
whoop, sprang through the door, and was gone. 

Everyone was startled, and it made me so 
nervous that I began to cry again. 

Cf There, there,” said Cousin Sally, “ don’t cry, 
Lucy. There’s nothing to cry about ; it’s only 
his fun. You had better go to bed ; you are all 
tired out.” 

cc I don’t want to go to bed,” I sobbed ; “ I 
want to stay with Philip.” 

cc I don’t want to go to bed either,” said Rosa- 
lie ; “ I want to stay with Phil, too.” 

cc Phil wants to read the paper,” said Cousin 
Sally. 


105 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“Never mind,” said Philip, kindly; “ I can 
read afterward. We will go into the sitting- 
room, and sit in the moonlight, and you shall tell 
me what you did up at Mr. Low’s to-day.” 

Rosalie told him about our afternoon ; I felt 
tired and ill, and did not want to talk. But when 
she came to the bee episode, I spoke. “ Seems 
to me I’ve spent the day done up in brown 
paper,” I said. 

Philip laughed a little. “Not quite all of it,” 
said he. “ You’ve had some pleasant things 
happen, haven’t you ? What was the nicest 
thing that happened to you to-day ? ” 

“ Chasing Fannie home,” said Rosalie. 

“ Yes,” said I, “ it was ; only it wasn’t just 
the chasing part of it ; it was the altogetherness 
of it.” 

By and by I asked Philip to tell us a story. 

“ Yes,” he answered, “ I will. Once there was 
a good little girl ” 

“ Oh, not a good little girl, Philip ! ” I cried. 
“ Don’t tell that kind of a story — not about a 
good little girl ! ” 

“No,” said Rosalie; “don’t tell about her, 
Phil. I hate her ! ” 

“ What about, then ? ” he asked. 

“ Fairies,” I replied. 

106 


WE GO FOR THE COW 


So he told a fairy story. I do not remem- 
ber it exactly ; that is, I mean, I have gotten the 
details of it so mixed up with other fairy stories 
that I am afraid I could not tell it straight if I 
tried. I shall not try. But I do recollect that 
it was about a girl named Violet, who strayed into 
Fairyland, and that it ended with a fairy dance. 
I remember that part of it, because when he fin- 
ished, he suddenly pushed open the half-shut 
blind, and said : “ See, there they are now ; ” and 
looking out, I saw a wonderful sight — a maze of 
faint, dancing glow-lights, appearing and disap- 
pearing in the black shadows. 

<c Fire-flies ! ” exclaimed Rosalie. 
cc Are they like that?” I cried. <c Are those 
fire-flies ? ” 

“ They are faint to-night, but some evening 
when the moon doesn’t shine, you will see them 
better,” he said. 

I watched them with fascinated eyes. But 
pretty soon Philip said that we must go to bed, 
and so I had to leave the lovely vision. 


107 



CHAPTER X 

IN WHICH WE GO INTO CAMP 

“ * O dear, no. 

Not for Jo ! 

Not for Joseph ! 

O dear, no ! ’ ” 

HAT is what Molly was singing, when. 



JL late the next morning, I went downstairs 
to the sitting-room. She was seated by the win- 
dow, sewing on her blue cambric dress. How 
she came to be staying at home that day I can- 
not tell you, for I did not ask her ; in fact, I 
did not think anything about it at the time. 
Perhaps they fell short of peas, or whatever else 
they were putting up, at the Corn-shop, and let 
Molly ofF until they could buy up some more. 
However, there she was, sewing swiftly and sing- 
ing gayly, although the weather was as hot, close, 
and foggy-damp as a dozen dog-days rolled into 


one. 


108 


WE GO INTO CAMP 

The moment that she saw me she began to 
laugh : 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! — He, he, he ! — Ho, ho, ho ! 
Well, if you aren’t a picture, I never saw one ! 
Gracious, Lucy, you look as if it were the day 
after the fair ! Your mother would have a con- 
niption fit if she were to see you now ! Ha, ha, 
ha ! — He, he, he ! ” — and so on. 

I always disliked to be laughed at, even when 
I could see no reason for such foolishness ; but 
when the reason was as plain as my poor, bat- 
tered and swollen face was to me then, being 
laughed at made me wretched ; I was ashamed, 
hurt, and angry all at once. Molly must have 
seen this, for she stopped giggling, and said 
kindly: “You mustn’t mind me, Lucy; you 
know I’m a giddy thing. You can’t guess what 
grandma has for you and Rosalie. She won’t 
let Rosalie have any till you come. Guess, 
Lucy.” 

“ Dough-nuts ? ” I guessed, not at all interested ; 
yesterday I had heard Aunt Eunice remark that 
she must make dough-nuts to-day. 

“ No,” said Molly. “ Go and see.” 

On the kitchen-table stood six little raspberry 
pies, with scalloped edges ; very small ones, made 
in fluted cake-tins ; flaky, well-browned, and crisp. 


109 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


These were for Rosalie and me. Rosalie wanted 
to eat them then and there ; but 1 did not feel 
very well, and had no appetite, even for dainties, 
so I said that I should keep mine till by and by. 

“ I shall eat mine now,” said she. 

“ I’ll tell you what,” said Kitty, who was sweep- 
ing the kitchen-floor ; and she stopped, and stood 
like a witch astride her broom : “We’ll go over 
in the woods after I get my work done, and 
build a camp, a regular Indian camp ; and we’ll 
have a picnic in it, and you can eat your pies 
then.” (You see, it was Saturday, so there was 
no school.) 

Of course the plan pleased us, but Rosalie in- 
sisted on eating one of her pies right away. Two 
were enough for by and by, she said. 

We were impatient to be off, and kept hurry- 
ing Kitty ; but she had a number of things to do 
first, for on Saturdays she helped about the house- 
work. At length she was ready, and with hatchet, 
knife, and ball of string we set out for the woods. 
We would not take our lunch yet, Kitty said; 
we could come back for it after our camp was 
done. We decided to build near the edge of the 
wood, so that Rosalie and I could run over there 
at any time to play. 

The dogs went with us. Prince was in his 


no 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


usual high-strung condition : barking, wagging 
his tail, jumping up to lick our hands and faces, 
scampering off as fast as he could go for several 
rods and racing back again, chasing his tail round 
and round, springing at flies, and teasing Rover. 
Rover was dignified, which was his usual condi- 
tion. He marched sedately along, gravely in- 
vestigating — now a weed, now a stone, a beetle 
travelling across the road, a spider’s web hung 
between two brambles ; now stopping and linger- 
ing; turning aside for a moment; going on again 
— but always sober and silent. 

Instead of going into the woods directly oppo- 
site the house, we went down the road until the 
house was hidden from sight by the wayside 
trees and bushes. This was at my desire ; I said 
that it would seem more like adventure into the 
wilderness if there were no house in sight. When 
we came out, I said, we should come to the high- 
way, which would be our first sign of civilization ; 
and going on cautiously for fear of robbers, we 
should suddenly see a human habitation and know 
that we were back in the world of men. Kitty 
laughed at me ; she knew that I was quoting from 
something I had read. The words were longer 
than I was, she said ; and besides, it wasn’t “ the 
world of men,” it was the world of women. 


hi 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“It will be the world of men to-night/’ I replied. 
cc No, it won’t,” she rejoined. “ The boys are 
not coming home to-night. They took their best 
clothes with them, and are going to Sam Wilson’s 
to stay. They’ll come home to-morrow. Molly 
said that she wasn’t going to have Bert sitting on 
her new dress and jamming it all up. And Phil 
said that he wouldn’t go to a dance riding on be- 
hind with his legs hanging out. Dick said, as for 
him, he should like nothing better; but if Phil 
and Bert were going to take their clothes and go 
to Sam’s, he would, too. I wish I could go ; I’d 
be willing to ride on the back. I’m going to 
tease mother to take me.” 

The road just ahead and behind us seemed to 
end in fog — soft, gray, mysterious ; the woods 
seemed full of fog ; but when we came to the 
place where it had apparently been, it was not 
there. You could not come to it — it always 
seemed a little ahead or behind ; and it did look 
so inviting — a very veil of wonders. 

<c Oh, Kitty, see what a pretty place ! ” I ex- 
claimed, pointing into the wood, where I had es- 
pied a little open spot carpeted with moss. It 
was like a room with pillared walls and curtains 
of mist. All around the edge grew bunchberries, 
making a scarlet border. 


1 12 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


“ So it is,” said Kitty. “ And there are a lot 
of young spruces, too. It’s just the place for us. 
Let’s go in here.” 

Kitty chopped off some small spruce-boughs ; 
and hard work it was for such young hands. 
Rosalie and I heaped them up together. Rover 
lay down on the soft floor, with his head on his 
outstretched paws, and watched our proceedings. 
Prince capered about, getting in everyone’s way. 

Overhead squirrels chattered and frisked, but 
watch as much as I would, I could not sight 
them, they were so quick and so far above me. 

But the mosquitoes tormented us. We fought 
them off, and back they came in legions, shrilling 
their war-cry. We found that we could not 
work ; our faces and hands were red with bloody 
bites, and we could only scratch ourselves and 
whisk the air with pine-tassels. At length Rover 
drew himself up and went away. 

“ We can’t stand this, either,” Kitty said, des- 
perately, laying fierce slaps all about her. “They’ll 
eat us up. We must carry the spruce home, and 
make our house in the yard. I guess we can 
build it in the corner of the fence.” 

“ I’d just as lief,” said Rosalie. 

I did not respond. “What do you say, Lucy? ” 
Kitty asked. 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


« It won't be so romantic, but I s’pose it will 
be convenienter," I said. 

“ Romantic ! ” she repeated, with good-humored 
scorn. “You are the queerest child ; you always 
want everything to be c romantic * ; and you have 
the funniest idea about what romantic is, any- 
way." 

“We were going to play Indian camp," said 
I. “You can't play Indian camp in a yard." 

“Why not, I should like to know ? ” said Kitty. 

“ Because it isn't a proper place," I answered. 

“ You and Bobby play Indian in your yard at 
home," said Kitty. 

“ That's different," I reasoned. “ It doesn't 
have round beds with geraniums ; it has tall 
things, to hide behind. And the bean-poles are 
like woods, when you get in among them. Ind- 
ians must have woods." 

“ Pho ! " said Kitty. 

“ No, they don’t — not always," she added, after 
thinking a moment. “ They camp in fields, 
sometimes. I could build this camp in a field or 
in the orchard, but if the sun should come out it 
would be too hot for us to stay and play." 

While she was talking she was tying the spruce- 
boughs into bundles, two little ones and one 
larger. We took them and hurried away, still 
114 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


fanning the air and scratching ourselves as we 
went. Out in the road Rover was waiting for 
us. Kitty said that if his back were not sore we 
could tie our bundles on him and let him carry 
them for us, but as it was we couldn’t. 

At the corner of the yard, in front of, or rather, 
at the front end of the house, for the house sat end 
to the road, we put our bundles down and untied 
them. 

“ Now,” said Kitty, “ the thing is, to get a pole 
long enough to reach to the top of the fence, 
after it is stuck in the ground. I’m going to the 
barn, and see what I can find.” 

We all went. We hunted high and low 
through the barn and the shed, but an old broom 
and four feet of broken bean-pole were the only 
sticks that we could find, and these were too 
short for our purpose. Kitty eyed them consid- 
eringly. “ If I could fasten them together in 
some way ? ” she said, as if questioning herself. 

<c What do you want to do, Kitty ? ” I asked. 

“ I want to put a pole into the ground right in 
front of the corner, and lace string from it to the 
fence, and lay the spruce on top for a roof.” 

<c How will you get the pole into the ground ? ” 
I asked. 

<c I can make a hole, by pounding a short stick 
ii5 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


in and pulling it out again ; I can’t use the crow- 
bar, it’s so heavy. Then I can put the pole into 
the hole. I shall have to tie these together, and 
lace the string from the broom part to the fence 
pickets. I’m afraid it won’t be very strong, but 
it’s the best I can do.” 

So Kitty set to work. She hammered a piece 
of edging into the ground until her hole was as 
deep as she thought it ought to be, but it stuck 
fast, and she could not draw it out again. 

“ I shall have to get the fork and dig it out,” 
she said, after working at it till her arms ached 
and she was red in the face. 

She got the garden-fork and dug it out. This 
made the ground soft, so that she bored her hole 
and drew the stick out again with little trouble. 
Then she lashed the broom and the broken bean- 
pole together. This was a difficult feat and re- 
quired our assistance ; I held the poles together 
while she wound the string around them, and 
Rosalie put her thumb on the first knot to hold 
it tight while Kitty tied the clincher. Then she 
stuck the pole in, but it wobbled every way. 

“ We must stamp the earth up close around it, 
and make a little mound of rocks up around it, 
too,” she said. “Lucy, you hold it while I stamp, 
and Rosalie, you hunt for stones to pile up.” 

116 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


Finally, the post was fixed, not very steady, to 
be sure, but upright in the ground. “ It will 
stay if we are careful not to hit it,” said Kitty. 
“And now we must lace the string across. I shall 
have to get a chair to stand on.” 

She fetched a chair from the kitchen, and then 
we began to lace the string. I held the ball, un- 
winding as she worked. It was a new ball of 
twine, but we reeled off yards and yards and yards 
of it. Some crows sitting up in the Norway 
pine kept cawing, as if they were counting how 
many we used. Back and forth went the string, 
in and out, around, across and back, over and 
over again. 

“ There, that’s done,” said Kitty, at length. 
“ Now hand up the spruce, and I’ll lay it on.” 

There did not seem to be so much spruce now 
as there seemed to be when we were bringing it 
from the woods, and after the thatch was on it 
looked very thin. But scant as it was, its weight 
made the post give threateningly. 

“ Remember, now,” Kitty cautioned, “ don’t hit 
it when you go in or come out, and be careful not 
to lean against it while you are in there, or down 
it will go, and all our work will be for nothing. 

“ What a looking object ! ” she exclaimed, sit- 
ting down on the grass to rest and view her handi- 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


work ; and then she began to laugh, in a half- 
vexed, half-amused way. 

“ Why, I think it’s nice,” said Rosalie. “ I 
like it. I think it’s a splendid camp.” 

“ I’m glad you are satisfied,” said Kitty. 
“ What do you think about it, Lucy ? ” 

Now its appearance was disappointing to my 
mind’s eye, for I had anticipated a picturesque 
hut densely roofed and walled in with evergreen ; 
but Kitty had done her best, and I was grateful. 
“ I think,” said I, hesitating between politeness 
and candor, “ that if the top were a little thinner 
it would be considerably too thin.” 

Kitty laughed ruefully. u We shall have to get 
Dick to make one,” she said. “He will do it. 
He is very obliging, only he has to have just so 
much nonsense over everything. 

“ That’s the beauty of being a man,” she con- 
tinued, still surveying the wobbly structure, and 
nursing her blistered hands. <c A woman will 
slave till her back breaks and her skin peels off, 
and not do half so much work as a man can do 
with a wink of his eyelids.” 

“ Now, let’s get our pies and have the picnic,” 
said Rosalie ; and she ran to the house for them. 

“ Half of them are mine,” she said, as we sat 
down on the grassy floor of our camp and pre- 
1 1 8 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


pared to lunch. “Grandma said that half of 
them were for me and half for Lucy.” 

“You ate one of yours this morning,” Kitty 
reminded her. 

“ That doesn't make any difference,” Rosalie 
returned ; “ half of them are mine as long as 
they last.” 

“What an idea!” said Kitty. “ c You can't 
eat your cake and have it too.' You ate one, and 
have only two left. Three of these are Lucy's.” 

“ Lucy has got to give me half,” said Rosalie, 
in a resolute tone. “If she doesn't. I’ll pinch 
her.” 

“ They are mine ! ” I cried, indignantly, “ and I 
shall not give you one.” 

Rosalie started in my direction, but Kitty 
pulled her back. “You stop that !” she com- 
manded. 

“ I'm going to have half,” said Rosalie, strug- 

gling- 

When Rosalie was determined to do or have a 
thing she usually got her way, for she was some- 
what of a spoiled darling. I knew this from ex- 
perience, as I often had to yield to her. “ It 
isn't fair,” I protested. “ She sha'n't have it, 
Kitty.” 

“No, it isn't fair; but, Lucy” (and here 
119 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Kitty winked at me, as much as to say, “ You 
know what she is ”), “ you're not hungry, are 
you ? ” 

“ No, I’m not hungry,” I answered; “but, 
Kitty, it isn’t fair.” 

“1’11 tell you how we’ll fix it,” she said ; “ you 
cut that extra pie into three pieces and give me 
one, and Rosalie one, and keep one yourself.” 
And she winked again, as if to say, “ Isn’t that 
better than giving in to her entirely ? ” 

I was not satisfied, but knew that it would be 
useless to stand my ground. Kitty cut the pie 
herself, with the knife that we had used in cutting 
spruce. We ate the three pieces slowly, and with 
relish. Then I suddenly bethought me that I 
had intended to give Kitty one of my pies. 
“ Oh, Kitty ! I meant to give you a whole one ! ” 
I exclaimed, regretfully. 

“ Well, it does taste more-ish,” she replied. 
“ I don’t care if I do have another piece of it. 
You may give me enough of another to make up 
a whole one, counting what I’ve had.” 

“ How much ? ” I said, doubtfully, for I was 
slow at figures. 

“ Why, two-thirds, Goosey. Can’t you count ? ” 
said she. “You have given me one-third of one, 
now you can give me two-thirds of another, and 


120 


WE GO INTO CAMP 


that will just make it. Here, you cut it this 
time.” And she handed me the knife. 

I made a cut as far as the middle of the pie, 
and then I paused. To this day I think it a 
puzzling matter to cut anything into an uneven 
number of equal pieces — thirds, or fifths, or sev- 
enths — and when I was that age the task was quite 
beyond me. I tried to remember the look of the 
pie that Kitty had cut, but I could not recall it. 

“ Kitty,” I faltered, for I was ashamed of my 
dulness, “ I don’t know how to cut out two- 
thirds.” 

“ Study it out,” she returned, watching me 
with a teasing smile. 

This provoked me to action, but I would not 
study it out ; I set the knife down swift and 
straight across the pie, cut it into six pieces, and 
gave her two of them. 

“ I feel drops dropping on me ! ” exclaimed 
Rosalie. 

“ It’s beginning to rain,” said Kitty. “ We 
shall have to run for the house.” 

And then a sad thing happened. In some way 
or other, one or all of us (I don’t know exactly 
how it did come to pass) hit the pillar and post 
of our camp, and down it came, whack ! pinning 
us to the ground. The criss - crossed string 
121 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


caught the buttons on our backs and held us pris- 
oners, while the shower drenched us, and the 
spruce-boughs tickled our necks and legs. Such 
a chorus of barking, laughing, and shrieking of 
little shrieks you never heard. Prince wriggled 
out first, then Kitty freed herself, and then she 
released us. And, oh, dear ! there lay my last 
raspberry pie in the middle of the mess, a com- 
plete mash, all sodden with rain. 


122 



CHAPTER XI 

IN WHICH WE INSPECT TREASURES 

O F course we had to change our clothes; and 
we got a scolding, too, from Cousin Sally, 
who, also, was driven in by the rain. She had 
been hoeing in the garden, and was tired, warm, 
and cross. 

“ Do sing something a little less foolish,” she 
said to Molly, as she flung herself down on the 
sofa; “ Im sick of so much nonsense.” 

Molly, who was tunefully inquiring: 

** * O where have you been, 

Billy boy, Billy boy ? 

O where have you been. 

Charming Billy ? ’ * ’ 

stopped, and asked good-humoredly: “What 
shall I sing ? ” 

“ Oh anything, provided it's serious,” her 
mother answered. 


123 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Molly immediately struck up : 

“ ‘ Hark! from the tombs a doleful sound * ” 

“ Molly ! ” Cousin Sally exclaimed, her cross- 
ness relaxing a little. 

“Isn’t that serious enough ? ” Molly asked, 
innocently. “Then what shall I sing?” 

“You know what I mean,” said her mother; 
“some pleasant little song — I don’t care what.” 

So Molly began again : 

“ * Little drops of water. 

Little grains of sand. 

Make the mighty ocean 
And the pleasant land. * ” 

This time Cousin Sally had to try to be cross. 
“ Molly ! ” she commenced, with would-be indig- 
nation, but it ended in a laugh. Then Mollie 
started “ Annie Laurie,” and Cousin Sally and 
Kitty joined in. 

When the song was finished, and Cousin Sally 
was looking the picture of good-nature, as she 
always was after “a sing,” Molly said : “Mother, 
I want your silver comb to wear to-night. Let 
me have it, will you ? It will look lovely in my 
hair.” 

“No,” said Cousin Sally, decidedly; “you 
can’t have it.” 


124 


WE INSPECT TREASURES 


“Now, mother,” Molly coaxed. “Just this 
once. I’ll be as careful as I can be.” 

“No,” her mother answered, with great firm- 
ness; “you wouldn't be careful. You break or 
lose everything that you lay hands on. You 
sha'n’t have that to destroy, at any rate.” 

“Now, mother,” Molly pleaded. “I will be 
careful of it, honor bright, I will. I won't let it 
go out of my mind all the evening; I’ll keep 
saying to myself, c Comb, comb, comb,' all the 
time. 'Cindy Hall is going to wear her mother's 
tortoise-shell comb, and you want me to look as 
well as she does, now don't you ? ” 

“ You’ll look as well as she does, without any 
comb,” her mother returned. 

“Well, just let me try it and see how it looks,” 
Molly entreated. “ Let me go up and get it,” 
she continued ; and not waiting for a refusal, she 
threw down her work and sprang away toward the 
stairs. 

“Here, here!” her mother cried. “I don’t 
want you ransacking in my things. I'll get the 
comb, and let you try it ; but don’t make up 
your mind that you are going to wear it to-night, 
for you are not.” 

She arose as she spoke, and started upstairs. 
Molly and Kitty, and consequently Rosalie and 
125 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


I, followed her, Kitty telling me, all the way up, 
what a magnificent comb it was — wrought silver, 
and set with five diamonds. 

We went up to the spare chamber, which was 
kept almost as sacredly dark as the parlor. 

“ Pull the curtain up a little way and open the 
blinds a crack,” said Cousin Sally. 

Molly ran the curtain up as far as it would go 
and pushed the blinds wide open, but her mother 
made her close them part way again. 

Cousin Sally went to the closet and took a box 
off the top shelf. It was a square, black box, 
with tarnished brass trimmings. This she put on 
the light-stand, and we all crowded around, respect- 
fully watching. Then she went to the bureau, 
unlocked and opened the right-hand little drawer, 
and took out several small boxes, which she put 
on top of the bureau. Then, reaching her hand 
into the back of the drawer, she drew forth a 
faded silk bag, and from this took a bunch of 
keys. One of these was the key of the black 
box, and I was breathless with excited curiosity 
as she slowly turned it and lifted the lid. No 
blaze of diamonds met my eye — only an array 
of pasteboard jewelry-boxes ; but this multiplied 
my interest. So many boxes, so many sights. 

She selected a semicircular box and slowly 
126 


WE INSPECT TREASURES 


opened it. Molly impatiently tapped the floor 
with one foot, and said : “ Oh, do hurry, mother ; 
we're dying to see it ! " 

The box was full of pink cotton-wool, and 
lifting a layer of that exposed a chamois-skin 
case. Out of this, at last. Cousin Sally took the 
comb. And, oh, how pretty it was ! 

It was not large, but it was chased and 
wrought beautifully, and set into the wrought 
work were five scintillating stones, as large as pease. 
I thought that they were real, true diamonds. 

Cousin Sally waved it back and forth, so that 
they flashed and glowed. “ Bend your head," 
she said to Molly. “ There," she went on, as 
she placed it in Molly's thick brown hair ; “ it 
does look nice. Molly, if I let you wear that 
comb to-night, will you promise me solemnly to 
be careful of it ? " 

“ Solemn sure," Molly promised, gayly, going 
to the glass, and looking at herself over her 
shoulder. 

“ You may have it," said Cousin Sally; “but if 
you should lose it, I would never let you have 
anything else of mine. I should feel dreadfully 
if anything happened to that comb." 

“ Now show us the other things, mother," 
said Kitty. 


127 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ You’ve seen them hundreds of times,” said 
her mother. 

“ But Lucy hasn’t,” was Kitty’s plea. 

“ Oh, Cousin Sally ! ” I cried. 

She laughed. “Well,” she said; “but you 
mustn’t want to handle.” 

“ No,” we promised. 

Molly came and sat down, with the comb in 
her hair. First Cousin Sally lifted the cover of 
a long and narrow-shaped box, and from a bed 
of cotton-wool and chamois took a silver arrow, 
which had one stone set in the shaft of it. “ It 
goes with the comb,” she said. 

“ I should be perfectly stunning if I wore them 
both,” Molly hinted. 

“ Well, you won’t stun the town of Westbrook 
yet awhile,” said her mother, dryly. But she let 
Molly try the arrow in her hair. 

After we had admired it to our hearts’ content, 
Cousin Sally carefully put it back in its nest, and 
opened another box. This contained a slender 
chain-bracelet of gold, the middle of which was a 
large, yellow topaz in a setting as delicate as the 
bracelet. 

Of course it wasn’t a real topaz, for although 
Cousin Sally’s folks had been better off once 
upon a time, they never had seen the day when 
128 


WE INSPECT TREASURES 


they could afford to buy real diamonds and to- 
pazes of that size ; but it must have been a nice 
stone, or it would not have had so nice a setting. 
Molly tried this on, too, and it shone and 
gleamed on her wrist. It was a wonderful color, 
too deep for sunshine, too pale for fire. “ It is 
like fairy gold,” said I ; “ that’s the way it looks 
when you see it suddenly at the bottom of a 
magic pool.” 

Well, to make a long story short, Cousin 
Sally showed us an assortment of treasures : a 
breast-pin to match the bracelet — one topaz, like 
a golden drop, held in little tendrils of gold ; a 
neck-chain of twisted gold links ; a string of old- 
fashioned gold beads, which had been her grand- 
mother’s ; a ring — a circlet of twenty-four tiny 
rubies (we all counted them, to make sure) ; a 
large oval locket, one side of which was a minia- 
ture of her father ; a cameo brooch — George 
Washington’s head on a brownish background, 
something like the postage-stamps that we use 
to-day ; a pair of long earrings — gold network, 
sown thick with garnets ; her grandfather’s silver 
shoe-buckles ; and a fan of pearl sticks, mounted 
with a picture of fancy-dressed ladies and gentle- 
men, holding hands and skipping round a tree. 

Cousin Sally told me about these things as she 
129 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


displayed them : where they were bought and 
how much they cost, or else who gave them to 
her ; that the buckles and the gold beads had fig- 
ured at her grandparents' wedding; that my 
grandfather brought her the fan from Barcelona ; 
that the ring was her engagement-ring; and a 
dozen other items of information. It was very 
interesting, and she enjoyed it as much as I did. 

<c There," said Kitty, when the last box was re- 
placed in its black casket and the key was turned 
again, “ what did I tell you ? I guess you didn't 
think there was such splendor hid away in this 
house, did you ? " 

I looked from Cousin Sally, with her sun- 
tanned face and hands, her old calico dress, and 
her thick, dishevelled, dark hair, to the dingy 
treasure-box ; and I enthusiastically exclaimed : 
“ Oh, Cousin Sally, it is like looking at the dower 
of a gypsy queen ! " 

Cousin Sally laughed, as she put the box away, 
partly amused, partly pleased ; and then, the 
shower being over, she returned to her garden- 
work, singing as gayly as a real gypsy queen. 


130 



CHAPTER XII 

IN WHICH WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 

I T was a clearing-off shower, and in the after- 
noon, when the sun had dried the grass, 
Kitty proposed our going after flag-root. 

“ Over where the frogs are ? ” I asked, eagerly. 
“ Yes,” she replied ; “ but if we’re not careful 
not to make a noise, we sha’n’t see any frogs. 
Will you and Rosalie keep perfectly still when- 
ever I tell you to ? ” 

“We won’t so much as wink,” we promised 
her. 

We went across a field, lately mowed, which 
was (as Kitty said) bristly walking ; over a tum- 
ble-down, rattly stone wall ; through a pasture, 
all hardhack and sweet fern and blueberry bushes ; 
under a rail fence, to the outskirts of a wood. 
Here were more hardhack and sweet fern and 
Hi 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


berry bushes. We had not stopped to pick blue- 
berries, because our minds were bent on flag- 
root ; but here were huckleberries — great, black 
bouncers. We simply had to stop ; and we stayed 
until we were in danger of forgetting our errand. 

Here, also, were foxberry leaves of all ages, 
from leathery old Sir Wintergreen, to middling- 
tough Checkerberry, and pale, tender little Box. 
“ If you get just the right kind of a foxberry 
leaf,” said Kitty, “ you can chew and chew on it, 
the same as you do gum, and it will keep on 
tasting tasty.” 

So we hunted for just the right kind of leaves, 
and found plenty of them. Kitty said that early 
in the spring she had seen the ground hereabout 
red with the berries. 

There were spotted red lilies around here, too, 
and growing near them were spires of rose-pink 
hardhack, which made a beautiful contrast. 

“ Hst ! sh ! Kitty softly whispered, catching 
my arm. “ Look over there. See ? ” And 
there, where the rail fence joined a brush one, sat 
the first squirrel that I ever saw in my life, a very 
little gray-brown fellow, with a tail as bushy as a 
drum-major’s pompon. He was chattering shrilly, 
and another squirrel chattered down at him. We 
looked up and saw his mate on a drooping pine- 
132 


WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 


bough over the fence. He screamed, she 
screamed, they both screamed. 

“ They’re calling each other names,” Rosalie 
whispered. 

This fancy so amused us that we began to gig- 
gle, and giggled ourselves into such a laugh, that 
we had to sit down. That made Kitty laugh, 
too, and she had to sit down — or, at least, she 
pretended so ; and there we sat laughing at our- 
selves and at the squirrels, who darted up out of 
sight and scolded us instead of each other. 

By and by we three sillies got up and went on. 
We went between the brush fence and the wood, 
till we came to a lane. On each side of it was a 
thicket of young alders, opening now and then 
into pretty little recesses where ferns grew. 
There were cow-tracks along this lane. Blue flag 
leaves stuck up like spears from the moist earth. 

The ground kept growing damper and damper, 
till it was really muddy, and at length, water 
stood in the cow-prints, and the flag grew so 
thick that we could not help treading it down. 
“ The King of Underworld is breaking through 
with his army,” I said ; and Kitty thought that 
“ quite an idea,” for it did look like an army 
trooping down the lane to meet us. 

“He will take us prisoners,” I said, “ and 
1 33 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


carry us down to his dungeons in the bog, and 
we shall have to live among frogs, and be bound 
with cobwebs and the roots of plants.” 

“ And the stems of pond-lilies,” Kitty added. 
Then, all of a sudden, she pinched my arm so 
hard that it felt as if she had pinched a hole in 
it ; but I did not cry out, for I knew that it was 
her signal to keep still. 

She pulled me to the right, in among the 
bushes, and Rosalie followed. We went on tip- 
toe. Kitty peeped through the foliage a mo- 
ment, and then made way for me. “ Peek,” she 
said, and I “ peeked.” 

There, right before us, was the pond, in a lit- 
tle circle of woods and wet meadow, but, of course, 
that was nothing to peep at; what had caught 
Kitty’s ear and eye was a bull-frog, squatting on 
a stone near us, at the edge of the water — a big, 
spotted bull-frog, with bulging eyes. He sat 
motionless for a few moments while we watched 
him, then swelled his throat and uttered a great, 
deep sound. I had no idea that a frog could 
make so much noise, and it. startled me into step- 
ping back on Rosalie’s toes. She screamed and 
pushed me, and when we looked again the frog 
was gone. 

We went through the bushes and sat down on 
i34 


WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 


a fallen tree beside the pond. The water was 
covered with lily-pads, like fairy rafts. 

“ Kitty/’ I said, cc don’t you wish that we were 
little enough to sit on one of those leaves, and 
sail, like Thumberlina ? ” 

“ Who is Thumberlina ? ” asked Rosalie. 

“ She was a teenie-tonty maiden, a little mite 
of a thing, as little as a thumb. She sailed on a 
lily-leaf drawn by a butterfly.” 

“ I shouldn’t want to be as little as that,” said 
Kitty ; “ I should be afraid a frog would gobble 
me. Look ! see the image of that swallow ! 
Doesn’t it look as if he were flying down below 
us?” 

The pond was like a mirror, reflecting sky 
and trees so minutely that Kitty said she could 
count the leaves on the birches as easily down 
there as she could when she looked overhead ; 
but wonderful and beautiful as the real world 
was, that world in the water was indescribably 
stranger and lovelier. cc It is a glimpse of Fairy- 
land,” I said ; “ all at once it will vanish, and 
nothing will be left but plain water.” 

“ No, it won’t, either,” said Rosalie. <c It will 
stay right there ; it always does.” 

“ And when we go home,” I continued, not . 
heeding her, “ it will be seven years from now, 
i35 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


and all our folks will be dead, and the grass will 
be green upon their graves.” 

“ Oh, what a — whopper ! ” cried Rosalie. 

“ Over there,” I said, closing my eyes till only 
a thread of sight remained, and gazing among the 
birch-trees, whose light leaves were fluttering in 
the air, “over there is a Lady. She has green 
garments, and she is making signs with her white 
hands. She wants us to go with her. If we go, 
we shall never come back.” 

“ Where shall we go to ? ” Rosalie asked. 

“ Down there,” I answered, pointing to the 
vision in the pond. 

“ Lucy,” said Kitty, “ you make me think of a 
man who used to go around the country selling 
lace and lead-pencils and things. He talked like 
that. He was always seeing spirits and hearing 
voices. He was as crazy as a loon.” 

“ How do you know he was crazy ? ” I asked. 

“ Why, because, of course he was. There are 
no such things, anyway. You are not really 
loony, because you don’t truly believe what you 
say. But he did. Come, let’s get the flag-root. 
I’ll take off my shoes and stockings and wade in. 
Did you ever eat any flag-root, Lucy ? ” 

No, I never had eaten any. Kitty said that 
it was middling good, especially when it was 
136 



















































% 

. 









WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 


sugared. Her grandmother would sugar some for 
us, she said. But when she gave me a piece and 
I tasted it, I did not like it, even middling well. 

So I lost interest in flag-root, and watched the 
little fishes gliding in the clear water, the skippers 
performing gymnastics on the surface, and the 
dragon-flies gleaming through the air. I became 
acquainted with many wonders that afternoon, 
although I must admit it was but a bowing ac- 
quaintance. We saw a great greenish moth under 
some leaves, and thought it a butterfly taking a 
nap. Kitty said that it must be the kind of 
butterfly that drew Thumberlina’s leaf, for one of 
ordinary size couldn’t stand the strain. We saw 
a bird’s nest in a maple-tree, and a hornet’s nest 
hanging like a gray bag from a limb of an old 
pine. I noticed the delicate new tassels of the 
young pines, and the fresh green tips of the firs ; 
and Kitty made me observe the different odors of 
the evergreens — the pines, the spruces, and the 
balsams. We saw some little balls of brownish, 
papery stuff, little bits of balls, about as big as the 
smallest marbles, hanging under the peeling bark 
of a rotten stump ; and when we broke them open 
we found them full of yellow seeds. Kitty said 
that these were not seeds, but eggs — spiders’ eggs. 
“ One spider lays a whole ball of eggs at once,” 
i37 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


said Kitty. “Isn't she smart? And each egg 
has a spider and a web in it. The balls hang 
and swing in the wind all summer. When the 
Line Gale comes it blows them open, and when 
it clears off you will see the air full of spiders' 
webs and little spiders floating everywhere." 

“ Isn't it wonderful ! " I exclaimed ; for I 
hadn’t a doubt that all she said was so. 

We saw a kingfisher dive for food and fly away 
with a fish. His coming was such a sudden sur- 
prise, and he looked so large, and dived so near, 
and made such a strange, harsh noise, that I was 
frightened ; but Kitty said there was nothing to 
be afraid of. Birds never attacked people, she 
said ; only eagles sometimes carried off babies ; 
but we were not babies, and there were no eagles 
around here. No other bird, she said, was large 
enough to hurt people — excepting vultures, and 
they would not touch a man unless he were dead. 

“ A roc might,” I suggested. c< A roc is a 
monstrous big bird. Rocs carry away elephants 
in their claws." 

Kitty said that she did not believe there was 
any bird big enough to carry off an elephant. 
“ It's just something that you’ve read,” said she. 
“ If you knew as many true things as you do un- 
true ones, you'd be an awful knowing child." 

138 


WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 


Under an ancient pine the cast-off needles were 
so thick that the ground was slippery with them, 
and we tried to slide on them as you do on ice. 
Pine-spills Kitty called them, and I wondered 
why they were called “ spills,” but that she did 
not know. We decided that it must be because 
they were spilled all over the ground. 

By and by, perceiving that the sun was getting 
low, we started for home. Kitty said that we had 
better go around the pond and strike through the 
woods to Fannie’s pasture ; for as her mother 
was going to the dance with Mollie, the milking 
must be done earlier than usual. 

As we were trying to cut off somewhat of our 
way around the pond, by crossing one end on 
stepping-stones, I misstepped into the water and 
wet my feet. When we reached home everyone 
was so hurriedly busy that nobody noticed my 
wet feet, and I did not think to mention them. 
Besides, there was a surprise awaiting me, that 
would have put the thought out of my head even 
if it had been there. On the arm of the sofa in 
the sitting-room hung a familiar-looking white 
dress and blue silk overskirt. I went up to them 
and looked carefully before I said anything, for it 
did not seem believable that they could be mine. 
I don’t know why it should have astonished me, 
i39 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


for there was Mr. Crowe, of course, to bring any- 
thing that my mother might wish to send ; but I 
remember it did seem like a miracle that my best 
dress, which I left hanging in our store-room in 
Portland, should be here. However, it certainly 
was my best white dress; there was the curious 
embroidered front, and there was the blue over- 
skirt with the shoulder-straps and crocheted but- 
tons. Yes, it was mine, beyond a doubt. How 
had this amazing thing come to pass ? “ Aunt 

Eunice,” I cried, rushing into the kitchen, where 
she was hurrying to get supper ready, “ how 
came my best white dress here ? ” 

“ Why, Mr. Crowe brought it, to be sure. 
How do you suppose? Your hat and other 
things are upstairs. Your mother sent them for 
you to wear to meeting to-morrow.” 

I ran out to the barn to tell Kitty. I knew 
that she had gone there to tease her mother about 
taking her to the dance. 

“ Besides, you haven't anything to wear,” 
Cousin Sally was saying when I went in. 

“ I can wear my white muslin,” said Kitty. 

“And muss it all up, so that it won’t be fit to 
wear to Sunday-school to-morrow.” 

“ I’ll be just as careful,” Kitty promised. “Oh, 
mother, do let me go ! ” 

140 


WE GO AFTER FLAG-ROOT 


“ No, you cannot. You might as well stop 
teasing and go away,” said Cousin Sally. 

Kitty took out her handkerchief and put it to 
her eyes, with a soft, sniffling sound, and made a 
show of wiping away tears ; but out of the eye 
farthest from her mother she looked at me with 
solemn intentness, as if to say, “ Don’t come here 
intruding.” So I ran away, and waited for her at 
the door. 

Soon I heard Cousin Sally’s voice, raised in ire: 

“ Oh, dear me ! You are enough to wear a 
saint to tatters ! Run away and let me alone ! 
You can’t go, and that’s all there is about it ! ” 

Kitty came skipping out, and gave me a cheer- 
ful poke as she went by. “ Can’t catch me ! ” 
she cried. “ Come in and see Molly ; she’s all 
ready to go, and she’s fine as a fiddle. Come 



CHAPTER XIII 

IN WHICH WE MAKE A RAID 

cc /^\ MOLLY,” I exclaimed, “ I think you 
V^/ are so pretty ! Solomon in all his glory 
is not to be compared with you ! ” 

Molly laughed, but she looked pleased. 

“ Do you think I’m pretty, Lucy P ” Kitty 
asked. 

“ I don’t think you are real pretty, Kitty,” I 
answered, with earnest frankness, “ but I think 
you are kind of pretty.” 

Molly laughed again, but Kitty looked a little 
put out. “ Thank you, Lucy,” she said, sarcasti- 
cally. “ I don’t think you are real polite, Lucy, 
but I think you are kind of polite.” 

Charlie, who had been ready and waiting for 
some time, became impatient, and began to paw 
the ground and call ; so Cousin Sally hurried 
Molly away. We followed them as they drove 
142 


WE MAKE A RAID 

from the yard ; then we sat up on the fence-posts 
and watched them out of sight down the woodsy 
road into the dusk, waving our handkerchiefs and 
shouting good-bys all the while. 

When we got down Kitty said : “ I think it's 
mean of mother not to let me go. I never went 
to a dance down in the hall. I’m just as mad as 
I can be. But I’m going to have a good time, 
all the same. I guess she’ll find that folks can 
do things at home, even if they’re not old enough 
to go to dances. I feel just like cutting-up.” 

“ What are you going to do, Kitty ? ” I asked. 

“ I don’t know yet,” she answered. “ I’m 
going to think about it. You two children keep 
still now, and let me think.” 

We kept quiet for several minutes ; then Ros- 
alie said : “ Haven’t you thinked yet, Kitty ? ” 

“ Yes,” she answered, <c I’ve thought. I’m 
going to make a raid. If you’ll come easy, and 
won’t let on, I’ll take you with me.” 

“ A raid ? ” I cried. “ Oh, Kitty, I should love 
to make a raid ! What kind of booty are you 
going to raid for, Kitty ? ” 

“ Candy,” said she. 

cc Where is there any candy ? ” I asked, think- 
ing of the parlor whatnot, and wondering if 
temptation had at length overtaken her. 

143 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


cc In the boys* room/’ she said, with a knowing 
smile. 

“ But, Kitty, what will they say ? They won’t 
like it,” I ventured. 

“ They won’t care at all, and they won’t say any- 
thing. Molly and I often get candy out of their 
pockets ; don’t we, Rosalie ? If you want some, 
come on.” 

I did want some, so I followed ; but away down 
in my conscience I felt that we were doing wrong 
— or else, why must we tiptoe up the stairs, lest 
Aunt Eunice should hear us ? 

In the boys’ room, Kitty opened all the bureau- 
drawers, and explored one or two pockets, before 
she found what she was in search of — a paper 
of candy. She undid it ; it was peppermint- 
drops. 

“ Pho ! ” she exclaimed, disappointedly. 
“ Nothing but peppermints! And awful strong 
ones, too. Do you like peppermints, Lucy ? ” 

“No,” I said; I didn’t. Rosalie, also, de- 
clined them. 

“ I don’t, either,” said Kitty. “ Well, c there’s 
more than one way to cook a hen ’ — let’s try per- 
fumery.” 

But as it happened, Dick, the one who used 
perfumery, had turned out the last drop. 

144 


WE MAKE A RAID 


“ Dry as a bone,” said Kitty, in disgust, turn- 
ing the bottle upside down on the bureau, and 
leaving it there. 

“ What shall we try now ? ” asked Rosalie. 

Kitty looked nonplussed. Then her eye lighted 
on a box of cigarettes, and her face brightened. 
“ Ah-ha ! ” she exclaimed, and took out three of 
them. 

“ What are they ? ” I asked. I had never heard 
of a cigarette before. That seems strange, doesn't 
it ? — that I should have lived to be eight years old 
and not even have heard of a cigarette. But, you 
see, they were not so common as they are now ; 
and my grandfather did not smoke ; and I sup- 
pose I was not very observing about such things. 
So I asked : “ What are they ? ” 

“ Why, cigarettes,” she said, in a surprised tone. 
“ Don't you know what a cigarette is ? What a 
ninny ! They're to smoke ; and I’m going to. 
You children can't, because Rosalie is too young, 
and if I should let you, your mother would never 
forgive me ; but I'm going to smoke three — one 
in each corner of my mouth, and one in the 
middle.” 

“ Kitty Reed ! ” I cried, in horror. 

“ Lucy Dale ! ” said Kitty, mockingly. 

She took the three cigarettes and a match 
i45 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 

downstairs. We went out to the barn, and there 
she struck a light. 

“ I suppose you think that I can’t do it,” she 
said, “but I can. Molly smoked one once; Dick 
stumped her to.” And she placed them in her 
mouth, one in each corner, and one in the middle. 
She looked so comical that Rosalie and I burst 
out laughing. 

As it is not easy to hold three cigarettes steady 
at once, especially when your lips are quivering 
with fun, Kitty kept dropping them, and they 
went out. So she had to give it up. 

“ I don’t care,” she said ; “ I did it a little 
while, anyway. Now let’s go to bed; I’ve done 
enough for one evening.” 

As we went through the sitting-room, Aunt 
Eunice woke from the nap that she was taking in 
her rocking-chair and exclaimed: “ Why, have the 
boys come home ? ” 

“No’m; they’re not coming to-night,” said 
Kitty. 

“ I know ; but I thought that I smelled smoke,” 
said Aunt Eunice. 

“ Are you sure ? ” she continued. “ I certainly 
smell smoke.” 

“ I’m certain sure,” Kitty answered. 

And then we three naughty ones dashed up- 
146 


WE MAKE A RAID 

stairs, giggling, and went to bed giggling, and 
giggled till we dropped off in sleep ; while poor, 
deluded Aunt Eunice went the rounds of the 
barn, calling: “ Boys ? — Dick? — Bert? — Phil? — 
Is anybody here ? ” 


i47 



CHAPTER XIV 
IN WHICH I REPRESENT NATIONS 
HE next day we went to Sunday-school. 



X The Sunday-school was in a meeting-house 
two miles up Duck-Pond way, on the Blackstrap 
road. When I saw Cousin Sally currying Charlie 
that morning, I inferred that we were to ride ; but 
she said no, she was currying Charlie for his own 
sake, not for ours, and we must walk. 

“And it’s high time that you were getting 
ready,” she added. “ Ask Molly to help you.” 

Molly was willing, so I began to put on my 
Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. 

Now I hope you won’t think that I am brag- 
ging, but, really, that costume was something re- 


148 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


markable ; and this is the reason why : every 
article of it came from some foreign land, and each 
one had what I called “ a history.” You would 
have thought me a bride being dressed for her 
wedding if you had seen the attention they all paid 
me, buttoning and hooking me, and patting me 
down, admiring, exclaiming, questioning : “ Where 
did you say this came from, Lucy ? ” “ Who did 
you say brought this home, Lucy ? ” and so on. I 
will tell you about it ; it is a rather long story, but 
I am sure that you will find it interesting. 

You remember my speaking about the curious 
embroidered front of the white dress? Well, it 
was a lawn that came from India ; and in those 
days, when embroideries were not so plentiful and 
cheap as they are now, and one spoke respectfully 
even of cc Hamburgs,” an embroidered India lawn 
was considered a nice dress. The front was lace- 
worked all over with palm leaves and singular 
flowers, and the embroidery trailed and meandered 
in vines around the skirt and sleeves. “ A cap’n 
my grandpa knew (he's dead now),” I told them, 
“ brought it home for his little girl ; and she died ; 
and when I was a baby his wife gave it to my 
mother for me, because she knew by the looks of 
me when I was young that I would be careful of 
it when I grew up.” 


149 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Kitty began to laugh at this, but Molly said : 
“ Hush up, now, Kitty ; I haven't a doubt she 
looked so when she was young. Go on, Lucy.” 

The overskirt was made from an old blue silk 
dress of my mother’s, which she had when she 
was a girl, and the ruffles that trimmed it were 
from the remains of a China silk of my grand- 
mother’s. I never called it a China silk, though ; 
I always said, “ From Far Cathay,” because it 
sounded more romantic. 

“ My mother wore the dress when she was in 
London,” I said. “ She had a blue bonnet to go 
with it. It had pink and white rosebuds inside of 
it, all around the face ; and she had a white lace 
mantilla. It was when they had the illumination 
about the Chimera ; and she got jammed in the 
crowd, and tore her dress, so it could never be used 
for a whole dress again, and that’s the reason there 
was some left to make an overskirt for me.” 

“And the stockings,” said Molly, “where did 
they come from ? ” They were open-work stock- 
ings, of white thread ; Molly had put one on like 
a mitt, and was admiring the effect of it over her 
white hand and arm. 

“ They came from Havre,” I said, “ but it was 
in Mobile that they had their history. Grandma 
brought them home when mother was a little girl. 

150 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


She promised her that she would, before she went. 
But grandpa was coming to Mobile first, so he 
bought a present for a little girl there. She was a 
shipping-master’s little girl ; her name was Mis- 
souri Alabama (she was named that because her 
mother came from Missouri and her father was an 
Alabamarer) ; and the present was a handkerchief. 
They were done up in paper, just alike ; and he 
gave the little girl’s mother the wrong package. 
And my grandmother didn’t find it out till the 
last minute, and then she said: ‘Alan, you’ve 
given Allie the wrong present ; you must go and 
change.’ And grandpa said : c I can’t ; I haven’t 
time. And what would they think ? ’ But 
grandma said : c I don’t care what they think. 
This vessel doesn’t go one step until you get 
those stockings again.’ So he went. But Allie 
was having a party, and had the stockings on at 
it, and was dancing ; so grandpa said : ‘ Never 
mind.’ But Allie’s mother said : ‘ Oh, yes, in- 
deed ; your little girl would be disappointed.’ So 
she whisked Allie out of the party, and took off 
the stockings. But Allie cried. And grandpa 
said : c Don’t cry, Allie; I’ll get you a pair just 
like them when I go to Havre again.’ And 
Allie stopped crying, and said : c Do they have 
dolls in Havre ? I’d rather have a doll.’ ” 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Did he bring her the doll P ” asked Rosalie. 

“ Oh, yes, of course,” I answered, emphatically. 
“ My grandpa always does things when he says he 
will.” 

“ Where did the hat come from ? ” asked Kitty, 
who was trying it on her own head. 

“ Mother bought it in a store in Portland,” I 
replied, cc but it was made in Leghorn. IPs a 
Leghorn straw.” 

“ Our hens came from Leghorn,” said Rosalie. 

“ Did they P ” said I, much interested. Molly 
and Kitty laughed. “ Does the hat have a his- 
tory ? ” Molly asked. 

“Yes ; it was last summer,” I resumed. <c We 
were going down Congress Street. We had been 
into almost every milliner’s store, and mother 
couldn’t get what she wanted, because it was late 
in the season, and all the hats were sold. And 
all at once she met an old friend, somebody she 
hadn’t seen for years. And while they were talk- 
ing I went back a few steps to look in the mil- 
liner’s window we had just come out of, and ’way 
up in the corner I spied this. The milliner said 
she thought it was sold ; that’s why she didn’t show 
it to us. Wasn’t it queer that my mother’s friend 
she hadn’t seen for years should come along just 
then, and give me a chance to go back P Mother 
152 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


says it was a coincerence, but Cap’n Weeks says 
it was c a downright providence, and no mistake/ ” 

“ But the shoes were bought in Portland, 
Lucy,” said Kitty. 

“ Yes,” I replied ; “ but you see it says € Paris * 
on the trade-mark. They’re French kid.” 

“ Sure enough,” said Molly. “ And what is 
their history ? ” 

“ I don’t know it,” I said, wistfully. “ Grand- 
pa lost them, going home, and a lady found them 
and carried them to the store, and so we got 
them. But when they came home one of them 
had a gum-drop in the toe, so something must 
have happened.” 

They laughed; and Molly said: “ Well, Lucy, 
you certainly are foreign.” 

“ When I’m dressed up,” said I, “ I feel as if 
I represented nations.” 

“ I should think you would,” said Molly. “ I 
don’t suppose you would think of such a thing 
as playing when you have that dress on ? ” 

“ Oh, no,” said I ; “ I might tear it, or some- 
thing. I always behave when I have on these 
clothes.” 

“Then you sit down. Miss Primsy, and play 
Sunday-school book, while I fix Rosalie.” 

Kitty wore a white dotted muslin, and a pink 
i53 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 

sash, and Rosalie a white pique without a sash. 
They both had white chip hats trimmed with 
pink ribbon. Rosalie’s coral beads were around 
her neck, but Kitty had no jewelry. 

“ Molly,” she said, in a coaxing way, “ let me 
take your set, will you? I’ll be careful of it.” 

“ Emma Ellen borrowed the pin,” Molly an- 
swered ; “ and you can’t wear earrings, because 
your ears are not bored.” 

“ I’ll find a way to wear them,” said Kitty. 

“ Nonsense,” said Molly; “ of course you 
couldn’t wear them. How could you wear ear- 
rings, excepting through holes in your ears ? 
Besides, you’re too young to wear earrings.” 

“ Oh, yes. I’m too young to breathe,” Kitty 
returned, pouting. She said no more ; but she 
was busy upstairs for several minutes after we 
were ready to go, and she would not tell what she 
was doing. 

We started. The day was bright and warm. 
The dust lay ankle deep in the road, but we 
walked on the grass and now and then wiped our 
shoes with our pocket-handkerchiefs. 

Kitty was unusually silent till we were out of 
sight of the house ; then she took from her 
pocket the earrings, fastened to loops of white 
spool cotton. She hung the loops over the tops 
i54 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 

of her ears, so that the earrings dangled below the 
lobes. 

“ There, now,” she said, triumphantly. “ Who 
says I can’t wear earrings ? ” 

“ Oh, Kitty Reed! ” we cried ; and “ Molly’ll 
be mad,” said Rosalie. 

“ I don’t care if she is,” said Kitty. “ Mean 
old thing! She and mother seem to think I’m 
a baby. I guess they’ll find out. Don’t they 
look nice ? ” And she shook her head till the 
long earrings swung like pendulums. 

The scent of new-mown hay was in the air ; 
grasshoppers shrilled ; butterflies fluttered in the 
sunshine. We walked on till my feet ached. 
We passed a graveyard and a number of farms. 
Then, by and by, we turned up another road, 
and soon came to a little white meeting-house 
with green doors and blinds. There were sev- 
eral teams fastened here and there under trees near 
at hand. 

I looked about for the duck-pond of my 
dreams, but saw no signs of it. I was going to 
ask Kitty about it, when a group of children 
coming from the opposite direction hailed us : 

“ Hello, Kitty ! Hello, Rosalie ! Why, Kit- 
tie Reed, you’ve had your ears bored ! ” 

Kitty held herself proudly, and did not reply ; 
i55 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


but when we came nearer together they saw the 
thread, and there was an exclaiming and laughing, 
and an admiring of her ingenuity, that pleased 
her very much indeed. She walked ahead with 
some of the older girls, while Rosalie and I went 
behind with the little ones. 

Soon I discovered that she was talking about 
me, for the girls would turn and look me over 
from head to foot, and I caught such scraps as 
these : 

“ My cousin from Portland ... on a 
visit. . . . Every stitch she has on came 
from somewhere. . . . That dress came 

from China. Chinamen made it. The 

silk overskirt is made from a dress her mother 
bought in London. . . . Her grandmother 

got the stockings in the East Indies. 

Even her shoes . . . Paris . . . French 

kid.” 

I was distressed — it was dreadful to hear how 
she mixed up the nations ; but being bashful, I 
did not correct her. It was a relief to me when 
we reached the meeting-house and went in. 

The Sunday - school was like all Sunday- 
schools ; the superintendent talked, the children 
sang, there was a buzz-buzz over the room when 
the lessons were recited, and then books were dis- 
156 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


tributed and cents collected. All through the 
session the girls kept looking at me and whisper- 
ing together, which was embarrassing, and when 
one girl reached over from the seat behind and, 
nudging me in the ribs, inquired : “ Say, sissy, 
how did you get such a black eye ? ” I was very 
uncomfortable indeed. 

After Sunday-school things were pleasanter, for 
the girls talked about that most interesting sub- 
ject, “ the raspberrying.” All of the big girls 
were going, and one or two of the little ones. 
Emma Crowe knew a place where the berries 
were so thick that you could hold your pail under 
a bush and shake them in, and she would show 
Kitty where it was. Sue Andrews knew another 
place, where the ground was red with them, and 
the bushes — oh, my ! Elvira Wood knew a nice 
shady place to go and eat lunch, where there was 
a spring. It was under an oak-tree, and the 
ground was mossy. Kate Jones’s mother was 
going to carry green-apple turnovers. “ The 
kind ma always makes,” she said — “ little three- 
cornered ones, with ruffles-like all ’round the 
edges.” There was a drawing in of breath at 
this, and a smacking of lips; Mrs. Jones, it 
seemed, was noted for her three-cornered turn- 
overs. Luetta Riggs had a new Indian basket, 
157 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


a fancy one, to carry her lunch in. Myra Grear 
wondered if the Paine boys would be there, and 
if at lunch-time they would sing some of their 
funny songs. These songs were so “ comic ” that 
some of the girls had “ nearly give up ” when 
they heard them, and one girl thought she c< should 
certainly expire.” 

I listened thirstily. My mind pictured the 
laden bushes and the crimsoned ground beneath 
them. I saw myself holding my pail and shaking 
down showers of fruit. I dipped water from the 
spring, and watched the flicker of light and shade 
on the moss under the oak-tree, while we sat 
feasting on three-cornered, ruffled turnovers. I 
fancied the look of the Indian basket — a round 
one, white, with red and yellow straws woven 
in, like Celia Tate's. I longed for the time to 
come when I should hear those side-splitting 
songs. 

The walk home was hot ; the sun beat down 
on us, and there was not a breath of air. We had 
not gone far when we came to some raspberry 
bushes by the roadside, and we went in among 
them carefully, for fear of hurting our clothes. 
Alas, for all our care, Rosalie tore her dress, and 
I got a stain on my precious India lawn. 

“ Ah-ha, now you've done it ! It will never, 
158 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


never come out,” said Kitty, at first, and she also 
teasingly lamented the fact that Rosalie must “ go 
torn forever ” ; but when she saw how troubled I 
felt about it — for it did seem almost sacrilege to 
stain a dress that came “ 'way from India” — she 
grew sympathetic, and comforted me with the as- 
surance that any kind of stain would come out of 
white goods, and reminded Rosalie that their 
grandmother could darn so nicely that you would 
never know a darn was there. 

“ But you ought to be more careful,” she said, 
reprovingly. “ I haven't torn my dress, and it's 
thin muslin, too. That's one trouble with chil- 
dren ; they don’t seem to know how to be care- 
ful.” 

As she spoke, she put her hand up to her ears, 
and the next instant she looked frightened, for 
one earring was gone. 

We walked back to the meeting-house, peering 
in the grass and dust all the way, but could not 
find the earring. Kitty was sure that she had had 
both of them when she came out of Sunday- 
school, for she had fingered them then. It must 
have fallen among the bushes when she was 
stooping to pick berries. 

So we went home in trouble. 

Nobody noticed Kitty’s unusual quietness at 
i59 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


dinner, for Molly and the boys were comparing 
notes on last evening's dance. Besides this, 
Cousin Sally was exercised about a number of 
things. The tear in Rosalie’s dress vexed her, 
and the sorry state of my travelled stockings and 
foreign-born shoes worried her, too. 

“ I suppose your mother thought that you 
would ride to meeting, or she wouldn’t have sent 
those nice ones, and she will blame me,” she said. 
cf Oh, dear, I ought not to have let you wear 
them ; but dear me, I have so many things to 
think of ! I declare, it’s nothing but worry from 
morning till night. Kitty, I want to know what 
you mean by your behavior last evening ? 
H aven’t I told you, time and again, not to have 
matches in the barn ? How would you like to 
have everything burn down, and be left homeless? 
And what business had you with cigarettes ? I 
should think you would be ashamed of yourself. 
What do you suppose Cousin Mary and Aunt 
Betty will say, when Lucy tells them ? They will 
think that I have a great deal of control over my 
children. I am so tried with you, I don’t know 
what to do.” 

Kitty did not say a word, and she had not a 
good appetite, although our dinner was one of her 
favorite dishes. It was a dish of which I had 
160 


I REPRESENT NATIONS 


never heard before — fried sheep’s harslets, and I 
liked it very much. 

Now here comes something foolish. I mean, 
so very foolish that I dislike to confess to having 
such a silly notion. But, as it is true, and some- 
thing else hinges on it, I suppose that I cannot 
avoid it. For, you see, if I had not said it, there- 
by showing myself to be one of those credulous 
people who can be made to believe anything, 
Dick would not have taken such amused interest 
in me, and then he would not have asked me 
to go to ride, and then — “ But that’s another 

story.” 

(After all, I forgot to tell you what I said. 
But, never mind, it was only about the harslets, 
and was too foolish to tell.) 


161 



CHAPTER XV 

IN WHICH DICK AND I GO DRIVING 
T about four o’clock that afternoon, while I 



JT\. was swinging in the barn, all alone, Dick 
came in, and he said to me : “ I’m going up the 
road a piece. Don’t you want to go with me ? ” 

“ It’s too far to walk twice a day,” I said, in a 
reserved way ; I had not forgiven him yet for 
laughing at me during dinner. 

“ Why, I’m going to ride. I’m going to har- 
ness up now.” 

“ Oh, yes ! ” I said, delightedly, forgetting my 
resentment. 

“Well,” said he, “don’t you let on to Rosalie; 
I can’t take a whole picnic. Mind, now, mum’s 
the word. Get your hat, and slip out there in 
the road, and I’ll pick you up when I go along.” 

“ If I go in to get my hat she will see me and 
follow on,” 1 said. 


162 



DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


“ Never mind, then ; I’ll get you a hat. Run 
out there and wait for me.” 

He brought me a broad-brimmed straw hat, 
one that Bert wore when he worked in the 
garden, and kept on a nail in the carriage-house 
when he was not using it. It was too large for 
me, so Dick tucked his handkerchief into the 
lining, to make it fit. He also pinned up the 
side of the brim that came next to him when we 
were seated in the buggy. 

<c I like to ride,” I remarked, as we started. 
“ I thought we were going to ride to Sunday- 
school, but Cousin Sally wouldn't let us have 
Charlie. I think children ought to ride some- 
times, as well as grown folks. I think it's queer 
that Kitty and Rosalie have to walk to school and 
home again, and you big men have to be carried 
all the time, when the Corn-shop is only a little 
way beyond the school-house.” 

“ That's all right,” he returned. “We need 
all our strength for our work. We're worked 
hard down there. Why, sometimes Phil and I 
are so weak after our day’s work that it's as much 
as we can do to climb into the back of the buggy. 
Of course, Mrs. Reed keeps Charlie for us. I 
don't see anything queer about it. Shank’s mare 
is the steed for young folks.” 

163 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


He was uncommonly agreeable that afternoon. 
He did tease and talk nonsense, but he also told 
me interesting things about the people whose 
farms we passed. I am afraid those stories were 
not true. No, I do not mean that; I mean, I 
hope they were not true. I know that some of 
them were not. But they were certainly very in- 
teresting. 

For instance : Once we came to a house on the 
left side of the road, and just beyond it, to another 
house on the right side of the road, and Dick 
said : “ Cross-eyed people live in those two 
houses.” Then looking gravely down into my 
serious, trustful face, he went on to tell the 
story. 

“ The curious thing about it,” was the way 
that they came to be cross-eyed. One was a man 
and one was a woman, and when they were young 
they fell in love. They kept on the watch all 
day long, hoping to catch a sight of each other, 
but they were so sly about it, that they cast 
sheep’s eyes instead of looking straight over, and 
the result was that both of them grew cross-eyed. 
“ The joke of it ” (according to Dick) was, that 
they never married after all, because neither of 
them cc could abide cross-eyed folks.” 

I believed this story, without a doubt; but 
164 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


when he told me that in the next house lived a 
man with three legs, I looked up incredulously. 
Still, he seemed so grave and truthful, that after I 
heard the story I reasoned myself into semi-belief 
in it. 

The man had cut his leg clean off at the waist, 
with a scythe, one day when he was mowing, and 
had to have a cork leg ; but after a while a new 
leg sprouted out where the other had been. It 
had not yet grown long enough to use, and Dick 
doubted whether it ever would be very useful ; 
for the cork leg prevented it from growing down 
straight, so that the man would have “ a natural 
straddle,” and Dick thought it would be “ mighty 
tiresome to walk straddle all the time.” 

I did not know whether to believe this story 
or not ; but, after all, I thought, although it 
sounded improbable, it might not be impossible : 
when my grandfather lost his finger-nail, a new 
one grew in its place, but when Cap’n Weeks 
lost his, he never had another come ; legs did not 
always grow out again, to be sure, but why 
couldn't they in some cases ? What was to 
hinder them, if they once started ? 

The next story was really unbelievable when I 
had fully taken it in. We were approaching a lit- 
tle deserted-looking house, black with age, and 
165 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


with ever so many broken panes in its windows. 
“ Doesn’t anyone live there ? ” I asked. 

“No one live there?” he repeated, in surprise. 
“ Why, that house is stuffed with people. They’ve 
broken the panes on purpose, to get enough air. 
When it rains they back up against the holes and 
keep the water out.” 

I looked incredulous again. 

“ It’s a fact,” he said. “ There’s the old man 
and his wife, and six sons and their wives, and 
each family of them has six boys and six girls. 
How many does that make? I never learned 
arithmetic.” 

“ Didn’t you ? ” said I. “ But you can count, 
can’t you ? ” 

“ I can count up to ten,” he answered, “ but 
not above ten. I never should know how many 
cans I make a day at the Corn-shop if it wasn’t 
for Phil. He does all my figuring for me. He 
can count first rate ; he’s been to college.” 

So I began : 

“ There are the two old people and the six 
sons and their wives — that makes fourteen. And 
if each family has six boys and six girls — 
Oh ! ” I said, daunted by the size of this sum, 
“ I can’t begin at that end, I must begin the 
other way. If each family has six boys and six 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


girls, that makes twelve in each family, and six 
families times twelve children would be — six 
times ten are sixty ; six times ’leven are sixty-six ; 
six times twelve are seventy-two — seventy-two 
children ; and fourteen grown folks added to 
seventy-two children are — seventy-two and ten 
are eighty-two, and four are eighty-six people. 
Eighty-six people in that little bit of a house ! 
Oh, Dick, you’re just fooling ! ” 

Dick chuckled, but he would not own up. 
However, I did not believe him. 

He was very kind. Once he got out to pick 
me an apple which he thought looked nearly 
ripe, and once he stopped to point out a bird’s 
nest in a bush by the wayside. 

I told him about the stain on my dress. He 
said that it would be easy enough to get that out 
— “just cut it out.” 

I told him how Kitty mixed up the nations. 
He said that it was scandalous. He had no idea 
that Kitty was such a “ jographibbler.” He must 
speak to Mrs. Reed about it ; it would never do 
to have Kitty going on like that. Jography was 
his strong point ; he must confess that he was 
weak in arithmetic, but he knew jography right 
down to the ground. 

I begged him not to say anything to Cousin 
167 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Sally, for I feared that it might get Kitty into 
trouble. He said, all right — perhaps Kitty would 
outgrow it — but he should keep his eye on her. 

By and by Dick stopped at a house, but he 
was gone only a moment. “ I couldn't find 
him," he said, when he returned. “ The old lady 
says he's down to A1 Little's ; so back we go, my 
dearie." 

“ Where is A1 Little’s ? ” I asked. 

c< Oh, home along," he answered. “ You'll see, 
when we come to it." And he turned Charlie 
homeward. 

Late afternoon sunshine was reaching into the 
woods, as we drove by them, brightening the 
shadowy aisles. We went slowly, and when we 
were not talking we could hear a sort of light 
sound, made up of various, little, soft sounds. 
It was so vague, that it did not seem to be an 
actual sound — it seemed as if the silence were stir- 
ring a little . You know what I mean ; you must 
have heard it yourself, when you were in the 
woods ; and if you never have noticed it, why, 
then, listen, the very next time you get a chance. 

I was listening to it, when suddenly a clear rat- 
tat-tat-ing came into it, and Dick said : “ That's 
a woodpecker. You don’t have woodpeckers in 
town, do you ? ” 


1 68 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


“No,” I replied. “We have robins and swal- 
lows and orioles ; and night-hawks, when it begins 
to get dark.” 

“ If I had time — that is, if I wasn’t so full of 
business, I’d show you a woodpecker, or at least 
a woodpecker’s hole ; but that must wait for an- 
other day,” he said. “You ought to be out here 
in May, to hear the birds. There are more birds 
here than you could shake a stick at.” 

“ Dick,” said I, “ do nightingales ever come 
around here ? ” 

“ No,” he answered, “nightingales don’t come 
to these parts ; but there’s a bird called the hoo- 
doo-bird that sings at night in the woods. It’s a 
rare bird ; only one person in ten hundred ever 
hears it. It sings out soft at first, growing 
louder, and drawling its voice, this way : c Hoo- 
doo, hoo-doo, hoo-doo, hoo-oo-oo-oo-oo-doo-oo- 
00-00-00 ! ’ ” 

It was a musical, long-drawn note, and I liked 
it. “ Oh, Dick,” I exclaimed, “ I wish I could 
hear it ! ” 

“There’s one thing against that,” he said ; “it’s 
bad luck to hear it. But if you’re alone when 
you hear it, and never tell a living soul about it, 
the bad luck won’t touch you.” 

“ Couldn’t I tell my mother ? ” I asked. 

169 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ No,” he answered, “you mustn't breathe a 
word to anyone. If you can't keep it to yourself 
you had better not listen for it." 

“What bad luck?" I asked. 

“ Oh, how can I tell ? All sorts of bad luck. 
The very worst kind." 

“ Fire and shipwreck and breaking your 
bones ? ” 

« That's no circumstance to it." 

“ I don’t think I want to hear it," I said ; “ it's 
too great a risk." 

“Can't you keep anything to yourself?" he 
asked, in a quizzical way. 

“ Oh, yes, I do, lots of things." 

“ What do you keep them to yourself for ? " 

“ Oh, I don't know — because." 

“ What things do you keep to yourself, now ? 
Tell me some of them." 

“I can't; I don’t know any now. They’re 
just inside things." 

What I meant was, that I had thoughts and 
feelings that I never spoke about. Everything 
that happened at school or at play, or that I heard 
or observed at any time, I told my mother and 
grandmother. These I called “ outside things." 
But, you know, you have a great many thoughts 
and feelings that you do not speak about — not 
170 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


for any particular reason, excepting that it doesn't 
seem to be worth while. These I called “ inside 
things.” 

At length Dick stopped before another house, 
which I had noticed in the morning, on our way 
to Sunday-school. 

“ This is A1 Little's,” he said.* “ I want to 
speak to one of those fellers over there in the 
pasture. You sit here, like a good little girl, till 
I come back.” 

“ Shall you be gone long? ” I asked, anxiously. 
Charlie never would stand quite still, and I was 
timid. 

u I'll be back in a jiff,” he answered. And 
away he went, his long legs leaping the stubbly 
field. 

No sooner had he gone than Charlie began to 
browse, moving ahead as he nibbled, until one 
side of the buggy was tilting down the roadside 
bank. “ Whoa, sir, whoa ! ” I cried, but he kept 
right on. To say that I was frightened would be 
a mild way of putting it; I was so terrified that 
chills ran through my bones, and my mind 
whirred in my ears. I looked for Dick, but he 
and the group of men had disappeared. I looked 
up at the house, but no one was in sight there 
either. What should I do ? 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


More and more the buggy tipped, till it was 
almost on its beam ends. I held on tight, but I 
did not scream out. Whenever I was frightened 
or excited or nervous, it used to seem as if a 
voice inside of me were saying, over and over : 
“ Keep still, keep still, keep still,” just like a 
clock. It was not always so, for sometimes I 
could scream out as quick and loud as anyone ; 
but generally I felt that way, and I did now. 

As the buggy inclined, I, being so little and 
light, swung around until I hung almost up and 
down, parallel with the seat. My hat fell off into 
the dust. Pretty soon, I thought, I should be 
pitching out after it. 

Would Dick never come? It seemed as if he 
had been gone for hours. The flies bothered 
Charlie, making him stamp, thrash his tail and 
neigh, and he kept jerking the buggy. I shut 
my eyes and waited to be overturned. I opened 
them again, because I couldn’t help it. And 
there in the road, by the edge of my hat brim, 
what do you think I saw ? I saw a glint of gold, 
that I knew at once must be Molly’s earring. 

Of course I was surprised. “ This must be 
the place where we picked the raspberries,” I 
said to myself; but I was not familiar enough 
with the road to recognize the spot, and was so 
172 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


nervous and frightened that I could not gaze 
around me. 

Anyway, there was the earring, and I must get 
it before Dick came, for if he found out about it 
poor Kitty would never hear the last of it. But 
how could I get out of the buggy ? I dared not 
try while Charlie was acting so. 

I waited. Very soon he noticed a choice mor- 
sel of leafage hanging above the road, and backed 
the buggy up again. How he did it without 
wrenching something, I don’t see ; but he did it 
safely, and I dared to sit up and draw an easy 
breath. 

He stood still for some time in his fresh feast- 
ing-place, so I gingerly climbed down, got the 
earring, and put it in my pocket. Then I 
thought: “ If I stay out, Dick will think that I 
was scared, and he will tease me ; if I get back, he 
will never know that I haven’t been there all the 
time.” So I gingerly climbed back. Then I 
thought : “ Suppose Charlie takes another notion 
to go down the bank ? ” And out I climbed 
again. 

When Dick returned I was sitting there under 
my hat, like a toadstool in the grass, and Charlie 
was lunching at some distance down the road. 
We walked down to him. 


i73 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ What did you get out for ? ” Dick asked. 

I did not mean to tell him, and as I had no 
excuse, I said nothing. 

“ Did you get out because you were scared ? ” 
he persisted. 

“ Yes,” I answered, reluctantly ; and then I 
added, <c that's why I got out the second time.” 

“ Why, how many times did you get out ? ” he 
asked. 

“Twice,” I answered, faintly. 

“ What did you get out the first time for? ” he 
asked, looking mischievous, as he saw that I did 
not want to tell. 

“ For — something — that I — wanted to pick 
up,” I answered, slowly and soberly, knowing 
that he meant to press the question. 

“ I guess,” he said, tilting my hat up with his 
hand, and winking at me, “ I guess — that it 
was — an earring.” 

“Dick! ” I cried, in astonishment. “ How did 
you know ? ” 

“You haven't?” he exclaimed, astonished in 
his turn. “You haven’t found Molly's earring ? ” 

“Yes, I have,” I said, excitedly, taking it out 
of my pocket. “ It was in the dust, right where 
the hat fell. I saw it when the buggy tipped. 
How did you know, Dick ? ” 
i74 


DICK AND I GO DRIVING 


“ If you’ll promise not to let on to Kitty, I’ll 
tell you,” he replied. 

I hesitated, but at length promised. 

“ Molly told me about it. She mistrusted 
what Kitty was up to, and sure enough, when she 
went to look, the earrings were gone. And after- 
ward she found that one had been put back. 
Now, see here, Lucy, you let me have charge of 
this earring, will you ? And you keep mum, too, 
will you ? We want to know what Kitty is 
going to do about it.” 

<c No,” I said ; “ I’m going to give it to Kitty. 
Kitty feels awful bad ; she doesn’t laugh or talk 
or anything.” 

<c Never you mind about Kitty,” said Dick, 
“ she ought to feel bad ; she’s getting too sassy 
by half ; she needs a little letting down.” 

“I don’t care, I’m going to give her the ear- 
ring,” I repeated, shutting my fingers tightly 
over it, as it lay in my pocket. 

“ Oh, well, give it to her if you want to ; but 
promise one thing : promise that you won’t tell 
her that Molly knows about it.” 

“Yes,” I agreed. “ I promise that.” 


175 



CHAPTER XVI 

IN WHICH I LISTEN TO THE HOODOO-BIRD 

K ITTY looked relieved when I gave her the 
earring. She was so relieved that she did 
not seem to have any other feeling about it. 
When I said, “ Isn’t it perfectly wonderful, 
Kitty ? ” she answered : “ Why, yes, of course ; ” 
but it was evident that she did not realize how 
astonished she ought to be. 

“What did Molly say?” I asked; for 1 had 
an idea that when you were sorry for doing any- 
th’ "g wrong, you had to tell of it. 

“ I haven’t told her, and I sha’n’t, either,” she 
answered. “ There’s no need of her knowing ; 
the earrings are all right. I should never hear 
the last of it. You can’t imagine how she and 
Dick throw things at me.” 

That evening, between supper and lamplight, 
Philip told me a story. Before it was quite done 
176 



I LISTEN TO THE HOODOO-BIRD 


Molly called him to come and help her hunt for 
the hymn-book. “ You’re letting that child im- 
pose on your good-nature/’ she said; “the minute 
you come into the house she takes possession of 
you. Tell her that you can’t bother with her.” 

I looked at him, and he smiled reassuringly. 
“ Oh, she doesn’t bother me,” he replied ; “ I like 
children.” And then he went to help Molly. 

I sat thinking about the story, and then about 
Dick’s stories. Dick was something like Cap’n 
Weeks, only Cap’n Weeks’s stories were of 
things that happened to him when he went to sea. 
Besides, Cap’n Weeks was so slow, always stop- 
ping “ to rec’lect,” while Dick rattled things 
right off. And then, Cap’n Weeks’s stories were 
more wonderful ; but, of course, more wonderful 
things happen at sea than on land. If Dick had 
only been to sea, or if Cap’n Weeks would only 
tell things the way Dick did ! 

But grandpa and grandma and mother, when 
they went to sea, never had such thrilling things 
happen as used to be always happening to Cap’n 
Weeks. I wondered why. I felt sure that if I 
only could go to sea I should have thrilling ad- 
ventures. 

I strolled out on the piazza and leaned against 
the railing. The night looked different from any 
177 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


other night that I had ever seen. All over the 
sky, in long, even ranks from north to south, were 
little, fleecy clouds, hurrying east as fast as they 
could go. Each cloud was distinct, and each row 
kept straight and by itself ; they did not crowd, 
but every moment it seemed as if those orderly 
lines were just about to huddle up and rush along 
together. High above them was the moon, ap- 
parently hurrying west as fast as she could go. 
She was so bright that her radiance silvered the 
little clouds, but as they raced by beneath her 
their under parts looked dark, like gray wool. 

“ There go the flocks of Skyland," I said to 
myself, “ rushing to destruction. They are be- 
witched — that is why they are rushing to destruc- 
tion ; and that is what is making their silver fleece 
turn black. They will plunge into the Sea of 
Darkness, and then they will be black all over. 
But the Moon is pulling a lock of each as they 
run past, and she will weave a silvery mantle to 
throw over them and make them white again. She 
has till morning to do it in, and if it isn't large 
enough to cover them all, or if any sheep don't get 
quite under it, those sheep must stay dark all day." 

Every time the moon shone out I could see the 
woods, but when she was hidden they seemed to 
be solid darkness ; and since she kept appearing 
178 


I LISTEN TO THE HOODOO-BIRD 


and disappearing behind the flocking clouds, the 
woods, also, kept appearing and disappearing in a 
strange, wild way. “ When the witches wave their 
wands east, the woods go out/’ I said ; “ when 
they wave west, the woods are there again. 

“ I shouldn’t like to be in them,” I thought. 
“ I shouldn’t like to be even down by the gate, all 
sole alone.” The idea made me shiver. And 
then I thought of the hoodoo-bird. 

I wondered what would happen to me if I 
should hear it. I could not help listening, even 
while I was telling myself that I would not listen. 
I wondered whether, if I should just begin to hear 
it and should stop up my ears and run away, any- 
thing would happen to me. I wondered whether 
it would be possible to tear myself away after I 
once began to hear it, or whether it would bind me 
with a spell. I wondered what it would seem like 
to be bound by a spell, to feel that it was too late 
to help myself, and that 1 must forever and ever 
keep it secret or else be doomed. 

I kept thinking and wondering in this way, un- 
til at length I did the very thing that I was telling 
myself I should not dare to do — I went (trem- 
blingly) down to the gate, and stood there listen- 
ing as hard as I could listen for the hoodoo-bird. 

As I think back and recollect that experience, 
179 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


it seems to me that three words will describe it ; 
and those three words are fearsome , alone , and 
listen. Everything was fearsome to me : the woods, 
with their wild blackness, that might be full of 
lurking things — unearthly Shapes, and Creatures 
with fiery eyes ; the sky, overrun with such a 
strange, vast multitude of hurrying clouds ; the 
air, so intensely shrill with the noise of frogs and 
insects. And I was alone , all sole alone> in the 
midst of it ; away from everybody ; waiting and 
listening and dreading to hear that mysterious, 
dangerous, beautiful call. I shrank up close to 
the gate, hugging the post with both arms, press- 
ing my face so hard against it that I could feel the 
blood beats in my temple, and listened, listened, 
listened , till every nerve in me seemed to be say- 
ing, “ Hark ! hark ! ” 

It seemed to me that I stood there for hours, 
but, of course, it was only a little while. Now and 
then Charlie sent a whinny from his stall. Once 
a hen had nightmare, woke excitedly and quieted 
down again. Molly’s gay laugh came ringing 
from the house. And Cousin Sally laughed. And 
Bert scolded Rosalie. But I heard no hoodoo- 
bird. 

I thought I saw a shadow cross the road, at a 
little distance above me, and that frightened me. 

180 




































* 









































































. 



































*5 










































I LISTEN TO THE HOODOO-BIRD 


But I did not see it again ; and no doubt it was 
only a shadow, I reasoned. Besides, I was afraid 
to stir a single step. I shook with excitement, 
and felt cold, although it was a warm night. 

All at once — what was that ? I held my breath. 
It was certainly the hoodoo-bird ! Far away and 
sweet and soft, but growing nearer and louder, 
came the musical cry : “ Hoo-doo, hoo-doo, hoo- 
doo, hoo-doo, hoo-oo-oo-oo-doo-oo-oo-oo ! ” 

I cannot tell you how I felt then ; but it was 
an enchanting moment. 

Again, again and again that melodious cry came 
floating forth ; and then it was silent. I kept on 
listening, but I listened in vain. 

Suddenly I saw a dark form stealing from the 
woods where the shadow had entered, and I ran 
as if it were after me. 

“ Where have you been ? Your dress is damp,” 
said Cousin Sally, feeling of my sleeve as I went 
panting into the kitchen. 

It was on the tip of my tongue to say, “ I've 
been hearing the hoodoo-bird,” but I caught it 
back by the very skin of my teeth, as the old 
saying goes. A thrill of dismay went through 
me. Suppose I should tell some time ? I shud- 
dered. But I was not sorry that I had heard the 
hoodoo-bird. 

181 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


In the sitting-room no one observed my damp- 
ness, but when Dick came in soon after, Kitty 
exclaimed : “ Why, Dick, you're soaking ! 

Where have you been ? " 

“ After apples," he answered, taking one from 
his pocket and biting it. “ Want one ? " 

“Green apples!" exclaimed Molly. “You 
don't mean to say that you've been after green 
apples at this time of night? You’re crazy ! " 
Dick laughed, ate his apple, and then joined in 
the singing. 

I did not heed the singing much ; the voice of 
the hoodoo-bird was echoing in my ears. I won- 
dered if Dick had heard it, but of course I could 
not ask him. 

Well, I never told about it ; and it was always 
a beautiful memory ; but when I grew up I found 
out that there is no such bird at all. And then, of 
course, I came to the conclusion that the shadow 
I saw going into the woods and the form I saw 
stealing out of the woods must have been Dick, 
who went over there and made that hoodoo- 
song himself. 


182 



CHAPTER XVII 

IN WHICH I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 
HE next day I went to school with Kitty 



JL and Rosalie. The school-house was at 
Pride’s Corner, two miles down the road. It 
seemed strange to be going to school in my va- 
cation, but Kitty said that they had to have a 
summer one out here, because a good many of 
the children lived too far away to go in winter 
time when the snow was deep. 

When we started, the wayside was still wet 
with dew, for the woods on either side of the road 
kept the sun from getting to work as soon there 
as elsewhere. The breeze was sweet with piny 
odors ; everything was fresh, bright, and spark- 
ling ; birds twittered and called ; it was a joyous 
morning. 

We carried our luncheon in a splint basket 


183 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


made by the Indians. Cousin Sally had bought 
it last fall, when an Indian family camped out in 
the woods below her house. Kitty showed me 
the path that led up to their camping-ground, 
and promised to take me in there some day. 

“ I wish you could be out here when they 
come,” she said. “ There’s the man and his 
squaw, and a girl about my age, and a little pap- 
poose, the cunningest little thing that ever you 
saw. Grandma made her a gingerbread boy, and 
she crowed and laughed and stuck it in her mouth, 
just like any baby.” 

Then she and Rosalie told me how the Ind- 
ians lived up there in the woods, in a house made 
of spruce-boughs, with a bed of fir inside it ; how 
they cooked everything in one kettle, slung over 
a fire out of doors, and used a pointed stick to 
take out their potatoes and other things ; how 
they cut down trees (of course it was the man 
that cut the trees down), pounded the wood into 
strips, colored some of the strips, and wove bas- 
kets. 

“ I’ve seen Indians,” I said. “It was when 
we lived in Eastport. Grandpa was there once 
and took me to see them. They had kettles 
hung over fires out of doors, just like your Ind- 
ians, but they lived in tents, and had wagons all 
184 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


around. There was a girl as big as you, Kitty — 
oh, she was so handsome ! She was the hand- 
somest girl that ever I saw in all the days of my 
life. Kitty, I think I should like to be a gypsy 
or an Indian — a handsome one — -just for a little 
while.” 

cc I suppose you think it would be romantic,” 
said Kitty, sarcastically, “ but I guess you'd find 
out. My, I wouldn't be an Indian for anything! 
They're the dirtiest creatures ! ” 

“ But I could be a clean Indian,” I ar- 
gued. 

cc Well, I don't want to be an Indian, or any- 
thing else but Katherine Doris Reed,” said she. 
<c You'd better look out how you wish that, or 
some of those fairies you talk so much about will 
be putting you under a spell, and some morning 
you'll wake up and find yourself black or brown, 
and then you'll wish on the other side of your 
mouth.” 

“ If I could change back to myself before very 
long, I should like the experience of it,” I re- 
turned. “ I should like to look at myself in the 
looking-glass, and say, c Can this be I ? ' And 1 
should like to go to school and see how aston- 
ished the teacher and the girls would be. But, 
Kitty, I think the kind of person I should like 

185 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


best to be is a Highlander with bagpipes, or else 
an Arab with a fiery steed, or a Spanish maiden 
with glorious great dark eyes.” 

Kitty laughed. cc I’m satisfied to be myself,” 
she said. “ All I want is to live in the city, 
where I could have a good time.” 

“ So do I,” Rosalie said, like a little echo ; “ I 
don’t want to be anything but Rosalie Reed, but 
I want to have a good time.” 

“So do I,” I said, eagerly. “ I wish I had a 
magic cap to make me invisible. Oh, I would 
have such fun ! At school, when I didn’t know 
the question, I would put on my cap and disap- 
pear, and, if I knew any other girl’s question, I 
would suddenly pop up in front of her and 
answer instead. At church, I would sit on the 
edge of the gallery with my feet hanging over, and 
walk on it way ’round to the organ ; and I would 
go down into the pulpit and sit with the minister ; 
and I would walk up and down the aisles, looking 
at the people’s faces, and when I came to nice- 
looking people I would stop and look all I wanted 
to. I would go into folks’ houses and read all 
their books, and see all their pretty things. I 
would climb up into carriages and ride. I would 
go on the cars and boats, and travel all over the 
world. And nobody would know I was there. 

1 86 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


“ I don’t know, though,” I continued, doubt- 
fully ; “ if I didn’t have Fortunatus’s purse, too, 
it would be an awful temptatious kind of life, for 
I should want to go into the stores and take the 
good things.” 

“ There, you see,” said Kitty, in her high-moral 
way. “ If you could have your wishes you’d 
end by being hung for a witch.” 

“ They don’t hang people for witches nowa- 
days,” I reminded her. 

“Well, they would you,” she rejoined; “a 
girl that was white one day, and black or red or 
goodness knows what color the next day, and that 
cut up in church, and fooled the teacher, and 
stole things. The trouble with you, Lucy, is that 
your ideas are too flighty. There’s lots of fun 
you might have without a magic cap, that you 
never think of having. Molly says that Dick is 
all funny-bone ; I think you must be all wish- 
bone. 

“ When I was your age,” she went on, “ I used 
to have plenty of fun ; now, of course, my ideas 
are different.” 

“What are your ideas, Kitty ? ” I asked. 

“ I should like to live in Portland, and have 
pretty clothes and lots of jewelry, and go to all the 
shows and dances, and have all the ice-cream and 

187 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


chocolate-drops I wanted, and take a trip to Bos- 
ton whenever I felt like it.” 

“ Here’s the school,” Rosalie said, interrupting 
us. 

The school-house was a brick building. I 
recognized it as the one that I had seen when I 
rode out with Mr. Crowe. In the yard in front 
of it the children were gathering, a few at a time. 
Pretty soon the teacher came — a girl not much, 
if any, older than her oldest pupils. Then we 
went inside and school began. 

I expected to sit with Kitty, but the teacher 
said : “ I think that that little girl had better 
come with Rosalie;” so I went down in front, 
and was seated among the A, B, C’s. All the 
boys there were A, B, C’s, but the girls were of 
various ages, and some of them wore long dresses, 
and cc pugged ” their hair. 

First, the teacher read out of the Bible, and 
then everybody said the Lord’s Prayer and sang 
a song, exactly the way we did at North School ; 
but the next proceeding was different. The 
teacher gave out examples in fractions to the big 
girls, and in long division to the middle-sized 
girls ; and then she called the little ones out on 
the floor to read : “ Here — is — a — pig. The — 
pig — is — not — big. The — pig — has — a — curl — 
1 88 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


in — its — tail.” (Or something similar to that.) 
They didn't mix things so at North School. 

“ Little girl,” she said to me, “ can you read ? ” 

Oh, how mortified I was ! To be asked if I 
could read, at my age ! I felt hot all over. 

“ I'm eight years old! ” I said, reproachfully. 

“Well, can you read?” she repeated. And 
then Kitty came to the rescue. 

There was one good thing about Kitty — no 
matter how much she might snub you herself, she 
always would stand up for you if anybody else 
did not seem to appreciate you as much as she 
thought they ought. She raised her hand and 
shook it vigorously. 

“ What is it, Kitty ? ” asked the teacher. 

“Why, Miss Mayberry, she can read elegant!” 
cried my champion. “ You've no idea how well 
she can read ; she can read anything ; she reads 
'most all the time. Why, she knows hundreds 
of pieces all by heart, and can say them without a 
single mistake. Can’t you, Lucy ? ” 

(I did not know hundreds of pieces ; I knew 
only about — I don’t remember exactly, but it was 
far from a hundred. To be accurate, it must have 
been less than fifty. In fact, I am not sure that 
it was as many as twenty-five.) 

“Oh, Miss Mayberry,” exclaimed one of the 
189 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 

big girls, “ let’s hear her say some of them, will 

? yy 

Miss Mayberry looked dubious ; she felt that 
she ought not to waste lesson-time, yet she was 
curious to hear me. “ You wouldn’t have time 
to explain those examples,” she said, hesitating. 

“ We’ll be as quick as chain-lightning, to make 
up for it,” the girl promised. 

“ What pieces do you know?” Miss May- 
berry asked me. 

“ I know some in c Standard Speaker,’ and 
some in c Chimes for Childhood,’ ” I answered, 
shyly. 

“ c Standard Speaker’? ’’ she said, questioningly. 
“ Yes, ’m. That’s my grandpa’s book. 
c Chimes for Childhood ’ is my book. I had it 
Christmas.” 

“Will you say some of them for us?” she 
asked. And I said : “ Yes, ’m.” 

“ If you will do your best till recess time,” she 
told the girls, “ and will give up recess, we will 
have her recite some of her pieces.” 

“ Yes, ’m,” they all agreed. 

At recess time she said to me : “ Now, little 
girl, you may stand on my chair, if you want 
to.” But I shrank back. “I’d rather stand 
right here,” I returned. 


190 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


I did my best, too. Very likely I did not 
pronounce all the words correctly, but I called 
them something — I did not trip. First I gave 
them “ Horatius at the Bridge ” ; then “ Come 
hither, Evan Cameron ” — “ On Linden when the 
sun was low ” — £C The boy stood on the burning 
deck” — <c Why is the Forum crowded? What 
means this stir in Rome ? ” — “ Old Ironsides ” — 
cc Pibroch of Donnel Dhu ” — “ Breathes there a 
man with soul so dead, who never to himself hath 
said, £ This is my own, my native land * ? ” — cc Io, 
they come, they come ! ” — <c Abou Ben Adhem ” 
— “ I know the organ is a living thing ; it speaks 
on Sunday, when the people sing” — and “ 'Twas 
the night before Christmas.” By that time I was 
all worn out. 

“Now, there's one more that I want you to 
hear,” said Kitty. “ It's the cutest thing that ever 
was. Lucy, say c Baby's Letter to Uncle.' ” 

It begins this way : 

“ Dear old uncle, 

I dot oor letter. 

My dear mama, 

Se dittin* better.” 

And it goes on in that silly style. But I 
thought it very cunning, and must have been 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


tired indeed when I could not say it. Everyone 
seemed to find it amusing, Miss Mayberry as 
much as any of the girls. 

But suddenly she looked at the clock, and 
cried : “ My gracious, girls, it’s dinner-time ! ” 

While school was breaking up for the noon in- 
termission she asked Kitty some questions about 
me, and Kitty talked of me in a surprisingly 
rose-colored way. According to her, I was cc an 
awful smart young one.” 

“You wouldn’t think so, to look at her,” she 
said, apologetically ; “ but, you see. Miss May- 
berry, since she has been out here she has got 
all bitten by mosquitoes and bees, and tanned, and 
hit by a ball, and everything, so she doesn’t look 
natural.” 

I was astonished to hear that Kitty thought me 
so interesting. Indeed, I was astonished to hear 
that I was so interesting. At first it seemed as 
if she were talking about somebody else, and I 
wondered who it could be ; then, when I real- 
ized that she meant me, I felt dismayed, and as 
if I ought to correct some of the things she said ; 
then I began to think that they must be true, 
strange as it seemed ; and then I felt perfectly 
puffed up. 

The big girls stood around and listened, and 
192 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


looked at me, saying: “My!” — “You don’t 
say ! ” — etc. The A, B, C’s stared at me in a 
respectful way. I kept getting puffier and puf- 
fier, although if anyone had asked me what I felt 
so vain about I could not have told. You see, I 
had never been bragged about before, and it was 
a delightful experience. 

Miss Mayberry went away to her boarding- 
place to get her dinner ; those of the scholars who 
lived at the Corner went home to their dinners ; 
and the rest of us went somewhere — I cannot ex- 
actly locate the spot in my mind, but I remem- 
ber that we sat under a great tree, and laid our 
napkins all together like a table-cloth, and that 
every big girl there had brought a pickle and 
every little girl had a slice of bread spread with 
strawberry jam. 

While we were eating dinner the big girls 
talked about “ the raspberrying,” and I listened 
with all my ears. 

“ Kitty,” said one of the girls, “ do your 
mother and grandmother know that old lady Lord 
is down from Windham ? ” 

“ No,” said Kitty ; “ when did she come ? ” 

“Yesterday,” answered the girl; “and she is 
going to stay a week. She’s at Luce Pride’s 
now, and she’s going to visit ’round, a day in each 
193 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


place. Of course she’ll be up to your house. 
And say, what do you think ? — she’s going to the 
raspberrying.” 

This seemed to surprise everyone. “ For 
pity’s sake ! ” they said ; “ why, she’s awful old ! 
— she’s seventy, if she’s a day ! ” But they 
agreed that she was a remarkable old lady. They 
told various anecdotes about her spryness and 
smartness, and concluded with the opinion, that 
even if she only half tried she could beat the 
whole crowd at raspberrying. 

Another girl said that the Paine boys were 
going, and that they had two new songs to sing. 
“ My ! ” said she. <c You wait till you hear them ! 
They’ll make you fairly double up, they’re so 
funny.” 

Some of the girls did not expect to get there 
before noon, because they felt that they must not 
stay out of school ; but others did not “ care for 
all the schools in creation, when there was a 
raspberrying on the docket.” Kitty was one of 
these. Miss Mayberry had agreed to have half- 
holiday, and she and the school were going to- 
gether, in time for lunch. 

After dinner the big girls talked of other mat- 
ters, less interesting to me, so I went to play 
with the children. We played “ catch ” and 
194 


I GO TO A VERY NICE SCHOOL 


<c hide-and-go-seek ” until clouds came up and 
sprinkled a little rain on us, and then we ran to 
the school-house. 

That afternoon was another delightful expe- 
rience. Miss Mayberry told me that I might sit 
with Kitty, and the big girls treated me splen- 
didly. They gave me some of their gum, and as 
they had among them several different kinds — 
white <c kerosene ” gum, pink cc sugar ” gum, 
spruce (the kind that you buy in the stores, done 
up in tissue-paper), and real spruce (the kind 
that you get in the woods) — I had quite a varie- 
gated mouthful. And they cut paper dolls for 
me, behind their books, which they piled in ram- 
parts on their desks in front of them. At the 
end of the afternoon I had eleven paper dolls. 
All of them wore red or white tissue-paper 
dresses, because those were the only colors sold 
in the Pride’s Corner store ; but the dressing was 
done with an eye to variety, some being white, 
some red, some red trimmed with white, and 
some white trimmed with red. I was charmed 
with them. 

I think that Miss Mayberry must have sus- 
pected what was going on behind the books, 
although she did not seem to observe it ; for 
when school was done, and girls were calling out : 
i95 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“Be sure you come again, Lucy,” and I was 
answering : “ Oh, yes. I’m coming all the time,” 
she spoke up, quickly — yet, with evident regard 
for my feelings, spelling as she went along : 
“ Kitty, don’t b-r-i-n-g that c-h-i-l-d with you 
again ; s-h-e interferes with our w-o-r-k.” 

Imagine how I felt then ! It took all the wind 
right out of my sails. 


196 



CHAPTER XVIII 

IN WHICH I REMEMBER THE SASSAFRAS 
LOZENGES 

R AIN clouds were moving over the sky 
when we started for home, but we did not 
heed them much. It had showered at intervals* 
all the afternoon, and grass and ground were wet, 
but we did not mind that either. We took our 
time, going aside into the woods every little while 
to pick bunchberries, hunt for fairy cups on 
lichen-covered stumps, listen for squirrels, or one 
thing or another, until all at once I noticed that 
it was growing dark. 

“ It’s a thunder-shower ! ” Kitty cried. “ Oh, 
sha’n’t we get a ducking ! ” 

Now I was not exactly afraid of thunder and 
lightning when I was a little girl ; indeed, if I 
was safe under cover I rather enjoyed the peals 
and flashes and the sweeping rain ; but I did not 
like the idea of being out where they could get 

197 



MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


at me. So at that moment home seemed a very 
long distance away. 

Far ahead, the woods on either side of the road 
looked nearer together, and through the narrow 
gateway of sky that they left open a fearful black- 
ness was coming toward us. The air had died 
down ; the leaves did not move a bit ; it was as 
if the Earth had stopped breathing. 

There was something frightening about it all ; 
and when the next instant the wind came in one 
great gust, whirling the dust up in clouds, thrash- 
ing the trees, and shrieking like a host of demons ; 
when lightning darted everywhere, thunder crash 
followed thunder crash, and a flurry of rattling 
hailstones beat down on us — I felt as if this were 
the end of the world, and was so terrified that I 
hardly had sense enough to run. 

We did run, though. People usually do retain 
their running sense, even after their other senses 
have deserted them. Kitty said : “ Scoot, now! ” 
and we obeyed her. 

Fleet-footed Kitty did not desert us little ones, 
so we kept together. The hail turned to rain and 
fell in torrents. We ran through mud-puddles, 
pools, rivers ; past the wood, the blueberry past- 
ure and Sam Cobb’s biscuit, till we were in sight 
of the house. Then, alas ! I almost dropped 
198 


THE SASSAFRAS LOZENGES 


some of my precious paper dolls, and in stopping 
to rescue them and carefully replace them in the 
book that I carried, I was left behind. Fright 
took entire possession of me ; I felt as if the 
props of the world had given way and everything 
were tumbling to chaos. 

How I got over the remainder of the road I 
do not know, but I did reach home with a whole 
skin, though it was a pretty wet one. I was so 
exhausted and wrought up and relieved when I 
had shot in through the barn door, that I fell in 
a heap on my book of paper dolls, and cried and 
cried and cried, and could not stop crying. 

Even after Aunt Eunice had rubbed me, 
changed my clothes, and given me ginger-tea, I 
kept crying by fits and starts, although not so 
violently. But she said that I would stop by and 
by, and so I did. For, when at length we were 
all dryly clothed, and went to the door to watch 
the shower clear away, I also brightened — enough 
to be interested in a rainbow that came with the 
sunburst. 

That was a glorious rainbow. It has always 
seemed to me that it had more colors in it than 
any other rainbow I ever saw, but of course it 
couldn’t have had, because all rainbows have the 
same colors ; still, it must have been very vivid, 
199 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


for I can see it now. One end of it dropped over 
beyond the woods at the eastward — in the field 
where we were going raspberrying, Kitty thought. 

“ I wonder what the rainbow is,” I said. 

“ The rainbow is nothing but air,” said Kitty. 
“ If we were over in the raspberry-field, and 
should put our hands through it, it wouldn’t feel 
any different from any other air.” 

“ Then what makes it look different ? ” I 
asked. 

“ I learned that in Sunday-school,” said Kitty. 
“ God made it look so on purpose, to remind 
people of the flood, and that if they don’t look 
out, there’ll be another one. 

“ Or else, it’s to remind them that there 
never’ll be another one — no matter how bad they 
are, there never’ll be another one ; I don’t re- 
member which,” she added. 

“ My grandpa says it’s the Bow of Promise, to 
keep people’s courage up,” I said. 

cc I guess that is it,” said Kitty ; cc I knew it 
was to put folks in mind of one or the other.” 

cc I like to think other things about it,” said I. 

“ What things ? ” she asked. 

“ Oh, about the pot of gold at the end of it, 
and about its being a bridge, and things like 
that.” 


200 


THE SASSAFRAS LOZENGES 


“You ought not to,” she said, reprovingly ; 
“ it’s wicked. It's well enough for you to think 
such things about common things, but anything 
that it tells about in the Bible it's wicked for you 
to think such things about.” 

After supper, when the ground was dry enough, 
Kitty and Rosalie went for the cow ; but Cousin 
Sally told me to “ stay right around here.” And 
she added : “ Remember, you have on your best 
shoes. If you spoil those you will have to go 
barefoot.” 

So I went out to the barn, to play by myself. 

Things began to go wrong with me. First, 
while I was swinging standy-up I fell and hurt 
my knee. Then Cousin Sally found the garden- 
fork and the hatchet, covered with rust, in the 
grass by our wrecked camp, and as I was the only 
one of the guilty party within scolding distance I 
had to be scapegoat. Then I followed a silvery 
moth, and before I realized where I was straying 
I had left a footprint in Cousin Sally's geranium- 
bed, as telltale as Man Friday's in the sea-shore 
sand, and my best shoes were coated with mud. 

Cousin Sally scolded me for that too. 

Then I began to cough ; and when she said 
that she had expected nothing less than that I 
would get cold, with such a wetting this after- 
201 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


noon, but that she shouldn't think I would begin 
to cough so soon, and I told her about wetting 
my feet on Saturday, she scolded me for not tell- 
ing her before. But she gave me some medicine, 
even while she scolded. 

I felt tired and ill, but did not know what 
really was the matter ; I felt little and lost, and 
the world looked very strange and dreary. I sat 
down on the piazza-steps, leaned my head against 
the railing, and looked listlessly into the gather- 
ing dusk. I longed to be at home with my 
mother. The only thing that made this place 
bearable for even one night more was the thought 
that Philip would soon be here; Philip was so 
comforting when you had that lonesome feeling. 

Kitty and Rosalie came through the yard with 
Fannie. “ What are you staying out there in the 
dark for ? " Kitty called, cheerily. 

“ I'm waiting for Philip to come," I answered. 

“He isn’t coming," she returned. “None of 
them are coming to-night. Didn’t you know 
that? Molly is going to stay with Luce Pride, 
at the Corner. Why, they were talking about it. 
They're going to a party.” 

Philip not coming home ! This was the last 
straw. No, not the last, for although it weighed 
upon my spirits more than words can say, I did 


202 


THE SASSAFRAS LOZENGES 


not break down yet awhile. But I did feel like 
crying. 

I wished that I were at home with my mother. 
At this time I should be getting ready for bed — 
bidding good-night, perhaps, before going up to 
my attic chamber. I could see our sitting-room, 
with grandma in her rocking-chair by the win- 
dow, knitting, nodding, catching herself at it, 
straightening up, and knitting on with increased 
diligence and dignity ; grandpa reading or writ- 
ing at the secretary, springing up now and then 
to walk the floor and repeat in a fervid, half-aloud 
way, something that struck him as true and tell- 
ing, or filling his pen in the inkstand and ab- 
sent-mindedly shaking the ink all over the floor ; 
mother reaching up to the high mantel-piece for 
a match, and lighting the small lamp, to go with 
Bobby and me. How long it had been since I 
came away from them ! I recalled how every- 
thing looked that morning. And then in a flash 
came a recollection of the sassafras lozenges that 
grandpa had put into my hand at parting. 

The sassafras lozenges ! What became of them ? 
I had not thought of them from that moment to 
this ! But, oh, how good they would have tasted ! 
And they were lost forever ! I put my head 
down on the step above me and burst into tears. 
203 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Why, Lucy, Lucy, dear ! ” cried Kitty, who 
was coming back from the barn. “ What’s the 
matter ? ” And she sat down beside me and put 
her arm around me. 

“ Oh, Kitty,” I sobbed, lifting my head, “ I 
had — a roll — of sassafras lozenges.” 

“ When ? Where did you get them ? ” she 
asked, in surprise. 

<c Grandpa — gave — them to me — when I — 
came away,” I sobbed. “ They must have — fell 
down — in the wagon — Mr. Crowe’s wagon — I’ve 
— never thought of them — from — that day — to 
this.” 

Kitty sat back and laughed. “ Oh, Lucy, 
Lucy ! Ha, ha, ha, ha ! ” she cried. Then, 
stopping short, she put her arm around me again. 
“ Poor child,” she said, kindly, cc you are tired as 
you can be. Come in and go to bed.” 

“ Grandma,” she said, as we went into the 
kitchen, cc see Lucy ; she is tired as she can be, 
and she’s crying.” 

“ Why, my dear ! ” said Aunt Eunice, leav- 
ing her work in the pantry, and wiping her hands 
on her apron as she came quickly to me. 

“ I found her sitting on the steps, crying,” said 
Kitty. 

“ Sitting on the steps ? ” Aunt Eunice re- 
204 


THE SASSAFRAS LOZENGES 


peated. “ I thought that she and Rosalie were 
out in the barn. I was going to call them in a 
minute.” 

“ Rosalie went with me,” said Kitty. 

“You haven’t been crying all that time, have 
you ? ” asked Aunt Eunice, drawing me to her 
and beginning to unfasten my dress. 

“ No,” I answered, still sobbing, “ I didn’t 
cry — till now — but things — kept piling up — and 
I — I couldn’t hold in any longer.” 

Aunt Eunice gave me some more medicine, 
and put me to bed. I went to sleep at once- — 
and don’t you think I needed it ? 


205 



CHAPTER XIX 

IN WHICH WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 

W HEN morning came I was so stiff and 
achy-all-over, that, although my first 
thought was, “ The day of the raspberrying has 
come at last,” I did not feel a bit excited. But 
after a while, when we had dressed and gone 
downstairs, when my joints had limbered, and a 
cup of warm milk and water had soothed my sore 
throat, I suddenly woke up to the joyful pros- 
pect. 

Cousin Sally and Kitty were getting ready for 
the picnic. It was one of those mornings when 
you cannot be sure whether the day will turn 
out showery or sunny, but Cousin Sally said, 
laughing, that she should go unless it rained 
pitchforks and darning-needles. She was in very 
lively humor, and joked a good deal as she 
packed the muffins, boiled eggs, hot gingerbread, 
and flaky pie that Aunt Eunice had been prepar- 
206 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


ing for her. Cousin Sally had a gay disposition, 
and (as Molly said) she found life poky in the 
country ; every picnic, circle, dance, or quilting- 
bee was a tonic to her. 

She wrapped a piece of red flannel wet with 
camphor around my throat, and she told us to be 
good girls. “ Now don’t you get into any mis- 
chief to-day,” she said, and we answered : “ No, 
’m ; ” but something in the way she spoke puz- 
zled me for a moment, though I did not dream 
of her not meaning to take us with her. 

We had put on clean dresses that morning, and 
we hung our hats on the door-knob, so as to have 
them handy. This was Rosalie’s idea. She had 
another idea also — she brought me the comb and 
asked me to comb the snarls out of her hair. 
When I expressed surprise she said : “ Grandma 
and mother are busy, and they won’t let us go 
unless my hair is combed.” 

A vague dread began to shadow my light- 
heartedness ; but I did not say anything — only 
combed and pulled at that tangle of curls with 
hurried perseverance. Poor Rosalie made no 
murmur ; she held her head as stiff as a hero’s 
upper lip, and when I had finished and tied her 
ribbon in a bow on top she actually thanked me. 

Then we put on our hats, and sat waiting. 

207 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Prince came and lay down at our feet. We waited 
until Charlie and the buggy were brought out and 
the lunch stowed away under the seat ; then we 
took our stand by the wheel, and waited there till 
Cousin Sally and Kitty came to get in ; and then 
we began to climb up ahead of them. 

“ Why/’ Cousin Sally exclaimed, in surprise, 
“ what are you doing? You are not going. I’m 
not going to take you two children.” 

My heart felt as if a cold, hard snowball had 
hit it. I backed down to the ground. Rosalie 
kept on, and seated herself. 

“ Get down this instant,” said her mother ; “ if 
you don't I shall take you down.” 

Rosalie did not stir ; so her mother lifted her 
out, struggling and kicking. 

“ I can't take you,” Cousin Sally said, in an 
arguing way. “ I didn’t know that you had any 
idea of going. You are too little to go ; there 
won't be any such children there.” 

“ Yes, mother, there will be,” said Kitty ; “ quite 
a number of the little ones are going with Miss 
Mayberry.” 

“ Well, I can't help it if they are,” said Cousin 
Sally. <c Lucy isn't fit to go. She coughed all 
night, and was so feverish that I was worried to 
death about her. She would be sure to get more 
208 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


cold, and be down sick. And just look at her. 
No, she isn't in a fit condition to go anywhere. 
And besides, if we expect to get any berries to 
speak of, we can't be bothered with two children." 

“ They're awful disappointed," said Kitty. 

“ I can't help it," replied Cousin Sally. “ If 
Lucy should take more cold, and be sick, her 
mother would never forgive me. 

“ I’m sorry, children," she went on, to us, “ but 
you will have to stay at home. You shall each 
have a saucerful of berries for supper, and when 
we come by the store I'll stop and get you some 
candy." 

Candy ! The idea ! What was candy ? I sat 
down on the doorstep, in speechless, hopeless, 
helpless misery. Rosalie flung herself, face 
down, on the grass, and kicked and shrieked 
and screamed. 

Cousin Sally was distressed. “You shall go 
next time," she promised. 

Rosalie screamed on. 

“ I will take you when we go after blackberries," 
said her mother, bending over her and trying to 
lift her. “ Why can't you be a good little girl, 
like Lucy, and not make a fuss ? " 

But Rosalie would not be pacified. 

Aunt Eunice called from the door : <c Go right 
209 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


along, Sally. It will stop as soon as you are out 
of sight ; it always does.” 

So Cousin Sally went. 

“ I’ll tell you all about it, and I’ll bring you 
something good,” Kitty cried back, but I did not 
heed her, nor did I watch the buggy depart ; I sat 
there like a stone image, until the sound of wheels 
died away and Rosalie ceased to scream. Tired 
out with her violence, she sat down beside me. 
“ It's meaner than mean,” she said. I did not re- 
ply. Prince licked her face and talked consoling 
dog-talk to her. 

Presently she spoke again : 

“ I wonder what kind of candy mother will 
bring us.” 

cc I don't want candy,” I said. “ I want to go 
to the raspberrying. I never went to a rasp- 
berrying in all the days of my life. I never shall 
go to one again. I want to go to the raspberry- 
ing.” 

While we sat there several teams went by — a 
wagon laden with baskets and singing folk, a 
spruce buggy with a young man and a girl, and a 
dingy one with a woman and a boy. These last 
stopped, and hailed Rosalie, inquiring if her 
mother had gone, and then drove rapidly on again. 

By and by along came Mrs. Baker and her two 


210 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 

little girls. They greeted us, and were surprised 
because we were not going. “ I don’t know as I 
should have taken Louie and Grace if I hadn’t 
thought your mother was going to take you,” said 
Mrs. Baker, as she drove on. 

This fired our resentment afresh. “ But it 
won’t do any good to scream now,” said Rosalie, 
in a philosophical tone. 

“No,” said I, “it won’t do any good to 
scream ; it didn’t before ; it’s just wasting breath. 
If I thought it would do any good, I’d scream 
the top of the world off.” 

“ There won’t be any more teams go by here, 
but there will be a lot going on the other road,” 
said Rosalie. 

“ A whole procession of them,” I said, mourn- 
fully. “And they will go through the woods, 
along a wide wood road, under the pines.” 

“ They will laugh and sing and eat pea-nuts,” 
said Rosalie. “ I went once. I think it was 
years ago, or else it was last summer. We got a 
whole lot of raspberries, great big ones.” 

“ As big as Aunt Eunice’s thimble,” said I. 
“ And the ground is red with them ; if you should 
set your foot down on them it would look as if 
you had stepped in blood. The people will hold 
their pails and baskets under and shake them in. 


21 1 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


And old lady Lord will be there, and she will 
shake faster than anybody else.” 

“ I wonder if that lady will take the honey- 
comb for us,” said Rosalie. 

“ Of course she will,” I replied. “And there will 
be the three-cornered, green-apple turnovers, ruf- 
fled all 'round the edges. And at lunch time they 
will go to that beautiful place under the tree, and 
sit on the moss, and dip their mugs in the spring.” 

“ I like to go to a picnic,” said Rosalie. “ I 
like to see the things spread out, and all sit around 
and hand them over. Only once an ant got on 
me, and bit me, and I hollered.” 

“ The Paine boys will sing,” I went on. 
“ Once there was a man came into our school, 
and all the slides went up, and the teacher spoke 
to the four rooms, and said that he would sing us 
a funny song, and he sang it. It was about a 
man who laughed. And he laughed and laughed 
and doubled up and laughed. Oh, it was so 
funny ! And we all laughed and laughed, too. 
The Paine boys will sing like that, and everybody 
will double up. Oh, Rosalie, Rosalie ! ” 

“ It's meaner than mean,” said Rosalie, again; 
and she was almost crying. 

I set my heel down hard. “ Rosalie,” said I, 
“ it's diabolical ! ” 


212 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


“ Let’s go,” she suggested. 

“ We don’t know the way,” I said, doubtfully. 

“ I know the way,” she replied. “ Every time 
we drive by it I say, c There’s the way we went 
raspberrying.’ It’s a road through the woods.” 

“ Does it go straight there ? ” I asked. 

“ I guess so,” she answered. 

I rose. “ Let’s go,” I said. “ When we are 
in the woods we can do the way Leatherstocking 
and the Indians did — follow the trail. We can 
follow the wheel-tracks. Come, Rosalie, let’s go, 
and let’s hurry.” 

She sprang up and took my hand, and we and 
Prince set forth on our adventures. 

We did hurry, feeling that there was no time 
to be lost. When we had walked perhaps a 
quarter of a mile, a wagon came along behind us, 
and a pleasant, man’s voice called out: “Hello! 
Going to school ? ” 

Rosalie answered: “No, sir; we’re going to 
the raspberrying.” 

“ Going raspberrying ? How far you going ? 
Don’t you want a lift? ” 

We gladly accepted. He jumped down and 
lifted us in. He even put Prince up in front of 
us. “ I’ll show you the place when we come to 
it,” said Rosalie, as he took his seat again. 


213 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


He was on his way from Windham to Port- 
land. He had a little girl of our size at home 
and was going to buy her a blue silk parasol when 
he had sold his butter and eggs. Her name, he 
said, was Ruby Pearl. I told him that I thought 
it a perfectly lovely name, and that I had a para- 
sol, a green satin one, with an ivory handle. 
This interested him ; he made me describe my 
parasol, asking the price of it, which I could not 
tell him. He told us that Ruby Pearl had a 
white kitten and a wax doll, and that her grandma 
was “ visiting down this way.” Then we came 
to the wood road, and said good-by. 

That was our first adventure. It made me 
feel blither and better-humored than I had been 
when we started forth. 

The wood road was beautiful. It was broad, 
white, hard, and even as a floor. On the right 
side stood a tall, dim pine-grove with a level car- 
pet of brown needles ; on the left was an open 
growth of gayer trees, such as birches and young 
oaks and maples, intermixed with small firs and 
spruces. Among them grew brakes with slender 
stems and spreading tops, like fairy palm-trees, 
and delicate, pale green ferns, and glowing scarlet 
bunchberries. 

Along the road ran wheel-tracks, and here, 
214 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


beyond, and yet farther on were scattered pea-nut 
shells. “ Rosalie,” I said, as I kept seeing them, 
“ let’s play Indian.” 

“ We can’t stop,” she replied. 

“ I don’t mean tame Indians in a camp; I 
mean wild ones on the trail,” I explained. “ We 
must go softly and you must walk behind me 
(I’ll be the Indian chief), and we must keep 
noticing things and making signs. We mustn’t 
speak at all, only grunt once in a while and make 
signs.” 

“ All right,” said Rosalie ; “ but what shall we 
make signs about ? ” 

u We must pretend that the wheel-tracks aren’t 
there all the way, and every once in a while we 
must discover some, or a pea-nut shell, and we 
must point to them, and nod, and point ahead, 
and go on ; and we must listen, and pretend we 
hear deer and bears and things ; and we must 
peer into the woods after foes ; and if we see a 
foe we must get behind a tree, and shoot a bow- 
arrow at him.” 

So we played Indian as we journeyed on. 
Even Prince entered into the spirit of the game. 
He would smell of the pea-nut shells and the hoof 
marks, looking up at us and wagging his tail, as 
much as to say : u We are right, this is the way 
215 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


they went ; ” then he would prick up his ears 
suspiciously at some light sound, go silently off 
into the woods and come silently back again to 
continue the trail ; and although he gave a sub- 
dued growl now and then, he did not bark. 
Prince was a very intelligent dog. 

As for us, we were stealthily watchful ; and 
when, by and by, we came to a bend of the road, 
we crept up cautiously, to make sure that no 
enemy was lurking there. If we had not done so 
I don't know whether I should have lived to tell 
you this story, for just around the curve we met 
a dangerous foe. 

“ Bow, wow, wow ! 

Here’s a cow ! ” 

cried Prince ; and, sure enough, there she was, 
headed directly for us. 

She was a large, fierce-looking, red cow — of 
that peculiar shade of red that goes with a fiery 
disposition. The instant she saw us she gave 
one terrible roar, and lashed her tail, and glared. 
Her eyes were like coals of fire, and she foamed 
at the mouth. Rosalie and Prince, who were 
used to cows and not afraid of them, were fright- 
ened at this one’s savage aspect. We got behind 
a tree. We trembled, and clasped each other. 

216 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


Prince held his tail between his legs, but he 
growled valiantly. The cow stood and glared. 

We watched her, waiting to find out what she 
meant to do. I recalled a story of my mother’s, 
of how once she saw a child tossed by a cow’s 
horns high into the air. I almost felt myself 
going up. 

The cow made up her mind to kill us, and 
came on the dead run. We shrieked, and she 
stopped a moment, lashing her tail and glaring, 
as before. Then she came galloping on again, 
and we turned and fled. 

We ran as if our feet had wings, right into the 
pine-grove, and she dashed madly after us. Her 
hoofs fell in heavy, muffled thuds on the soft car- 
pet of needles. Dry twigs snapped, and fallen 
wood crashed underfoot. 

On, on we went. Rosalie stumbled over 
Prince, fell, sprang up and rushed along again. I 
caught my dress on a broken branch, tore it away, 
and raced after Rosalie. I could hear the cow 
panting behind me. I gasped for breath, and my 
blood seemed to sing in my ears. I grew dizzy, 
and went plunging, I knew not where. 

When my wits came back to me, I found that 
we were in the underbrush, hedged about, like 
enchanted princesses, with bushes as stiff as steel 
217 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


bars. We could not break or bend them; we 
were imprisoned. But the cow did not follow us, 
and that was one thing to be thankful for. 

“ Let's crawl underneath," Rosalie proposed. 

We got down on our hands and knees and 
crawled. Prince did better than we, for the stems 
whipped our faces, and caught at Rosalie's hair. 
The ground was moist, covered with matted 
leaves, mossy in places, and suggestive of bugs. 
We came to a fallen tree coated with scratchy 
lichens ; we came to a patch of running black- 
berry, full of prickles ; we bumped our heads 
against a rock ; we rolled into a hollow ; and all 
these things happened over and over again. 

“ It’s a long road that has no turn," says the 
proverb. Our “ turn " came in a swamp. All at 
once we felt our hands sinking into wetness, and 
at the same time our heads poked out of the un- 
derbrush. 

A black, miry cow-path lay before us. It was 
strung with pools of water along its length as far 
as we could see, and alder bushes walled it in. 
There was nothing to do but wade, and wade we 
did. 

We waded and waded, through pool after pool 
and mire after mire, and at length came to a 
brook. There was a corduroy bridge over the 
218 


WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


brook (at least, Kitty said afterward, from my 
♦ description, that it must be a corduroy bridge), 
but we did not walk on it ; we waded through the 
water, to wash the mud off our shoes. 

Then we looked about us. “ Rosalie,” I said, 
in a grave tone, “ we are lost.” 

“ I know it,” she responded, lightly ; cc and I’m 
hungry.” 

“ I’m tired. I feel as if my feet would break 
off,” I said. “ What shall we do, Rosalie ? ” 

“ What can we do? ” she asked. 

“ If we were wrecked on a desert island we 
could hoist a signal, and if we were lost on the 
plains we could build a bonfire ; the proper way 
here is to climb a tree, but I don’t see how we 
can,” I said, helplessly. 

“ Let’s follow the brook,” said Rosalie. cc I 
don’t want to go the cow-path way any more — 
we might meet old Thunder-and-lightning again. 
See Prince drink, poor fellow. Let us drink, too, 
and wash our faces ; I’m so hot I’m almost 
melted.” 

We lay on our stomachs, and putting our lips 
to the water sucked it in, a refreshing draught* 
Then we splashed our faces, dabbled our hands, 
and ducked our heads. Rosalie wrung the wet 
from her hair, and it curled up tight and crisp. 

219 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Our dresses were wet, but we were so warm that 
it did not matter to us how wet we were. 

We decided to go up stream, because it looked 
prettier that way. The sides of the brook were 
fringed with ferns, and it flowed over sandy shal- 
lows, rippling brightly in the sun. The banks 
were so overgrown with bushes that we had to 
walk in the water a part of the way. 

The brook took us back to the pine-grove, 
only to a different place from that where we had 
met our second adventure. In this place the 
trees stood closer together, and looked as high as 
church-spires ; hardly any sky could be seen ; 
scarcely any plants grew on the ground, which 
was all one bare, brown carpet ; it was a gloomy, 
lonesome wood. 

We were so tired that we had to sit down and 
rest. The day was, as I said once before, a day 
of uncertain temper, now smiling, now threatening 
to weep. When the sun shone out the world 
seemed full of hope and the zest of adventure ; 
when he hid his face in a cloud handkerchief every- 
thing seemed dreary and sad. He hid his face 
now, and it looked as if night were settling down. 

Suppose we should never find our way out, I 
thought with a shudder. I began to imagine 
that appalling fate. How black the darkness of 


220 




































































WE GO UPON THE TRAIL 


night must be here ! I was afraid of utter dark- 
ness, even in my own bedroom at home, but here 
it would be unbearable. “ Rosalie/' I said, “ s’pose 
we should have to stay here all night P ” 

“We sha’n’t,” she returned, cheerfully ; “we 
shall go up the brook and find them.” 

“ How still it is,” I said. “ Out there we heard 
birds, and grasshoppers, and things, but here you 
can't hear anything but crows. They're saying : 
c Lost, lost, lost.' ” 

“ It's cooler here than it was out there,” she 
said, in a tone of comfort. 

“Yes, it is,” I agreed; “I feel all nice and 
shivery. But it's a melancholic place.” 

Rosalie laughed. Her laughter sounded eerie, 
and set the crows cawing harder than ever. 
Prince began to caper and bark, and she and he 
rolled over and over together on the pine floor 
till they were plastered with spills. 

“ It may be a magic wood,” I said. “ S’pose 
all these trees should move with us, and no mat- 
ter how fast we went we should never get to the 
end P ” 

“ Poh ! I could run faster than a tree,” said 
Rosalie. 

“ S’pose they all turned to giants and went 
stalking over us ? ” 


221 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ They couldn’t/’ she returned ; “ trees can’t 
turn to giants ; trees always stay trees.” 

“ S’pose this was an Indian wood?” I said, 
taking another tack ; “ an Indian wood, all full of 
Indians ? S’pose a long file of Indians, all war- 
paint and feathers and scalps, should come steal- 
ing through the trees over there ? S’pose they 
should war-whoop at us, and tomahawk us, and 
scalp us, and leave us for dead ? ” 

“Poh! I shouldn’t be scared,” said Rosalie; 
but she did glance over her shoulder. 

“ S’pose it’s a haunted wood ? ” I said, in a 
hushed voice. “ S’pose when it gets dark white 
Shapes start up all at once, everywhere, and wind 
in and out among the trees, sighing mournfully ?” 

Rosalie got up. “ I’m rested now,” she said. 
Evidently she was determined not to be scared. 
I was not rested, but I also arose, and quickly, 
too ; not for worlds would I have been left there 
alone, even one minute. 

We followed the brook again, a mere thread of 
water, silently coming down through the pines, 
which gradually grew less sombre, and began to 
mingle with other kinds of trees. And here we 
had our third adventure. 


222 



CHAPTER XX 

IN WHICH WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 

cc ’OH ! What’s that?” said Rosalie, stopping 
and grasping my arm. 

“ It’s somebody crying,” I said, as I listened. 

Prince went ahead to find out, and after a 
doubtful, alarmed look at each other, we followed 
him. 

The crying was not very loud, and was fright- 
ened merely in a forlorn sort of way, but now it 
rose to shrill screams of terror. “ Don’t ! Don’t ! 
Go ’way ! Go ’way ! ” shrieked a frantic voice, 
and with it mingled Prince’s excited yelps and 
barks. 

We hurried. What could be the matter ? I 
must confess the thought of another cow made 
me hesitate, but those heart-rending shrieks 
spurred me on again. We hastily parted the 
223 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


bushes upon a hapless sight. It was a little girl 
wedged in the crotch of a wild cherry tree. 

The crotch was about four feet from the ground, 
and she hung by her waist, her legs dangling on 
one side, her head and arms struggling on the 
other. Prince was leaping up to express sym- 
pathy by licking her face, but she did not seem 
to be understanding his attentions. “ Prince ! 
Prince ! ” I cried ; for I knew at once how she 
was feeling. 

“ Why, it's Louie Baker ! ” exclaimed Rosalie. 
“ Here, sir ! Down, Prince, down! He won’t 
hurt you, Louie ; he’s only kissing you. Here, 
Prince, come here! Now you can get down, 
Louie ; he won’t bark at you again.” 

“ I can’t ! ” wailed Louie. “ I’m stuck ! I’m 
stuck fast ! ” 

“ We’ll pull you down,” said Rosalie, promptly. 
We each seized a foot and pulled with energy, 
but it did not start her. Indeed, she redoubled 
her screams, and begged us to let her alone. “ It 
hurts ! It hurts ! Oh, don’t ! Oh, don’t ! ” she 
cried. 

“ How did you get stuck ? ” Rosalie asked, as 
we stopped. 

“ I was ’fraid of the dog,” said Louie, sobbing. 
“ I jumped up on the stone and tried to climb, 
224 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


and I slipped and fell. Oh, dear, oh, dear ! 
What shall I do ? ” 

Louie was a very slim little girl ; she fitted in 
tight between the forking branches. We did 
not know what to do for her. It is remarkable 
how much easier it is to get up a tree than it is 
to come down again. I stood and studied the 
problem, and at length said : 

“ We must roll one of those stones up in front 
of her, and I will stand on it and boost, while 
you stand on the one behind and pull her down.” 

We rolled the stone up to the tree. Probably 
it was not a large stone, but it seemed heavy to 
us. Then I mounted it, and, holding on to the 
tree-trunk with both hands, put my head up 
against her chest and pushed with all my might. 
At the same time Rosalie jerked and tugged at 
poor Louie from behind. 

For a while it did no good, but we kept at it. 
Louie cried all the time, and her tears dropped 
hot and fast upon my back. Finally we suc- 
ceeded, and she slid to the ground. Then we all 
sat down to rest. 

She was somewhat bruised, and her dress was 
torn, but no bones were broken. She cried for 
some time and we had hard work to comfort her. 
When she found that she was lost she called and 
225 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


called, she said, but no one answered, and she 
walked and walked, but could not find her way- 
back to the raspberry-field. 

“Never mind,” said Rosalie, cheerily; “that’s 
where we’re going; we’ll take you with us.” 

We started again, still keeping along the brook- 
side. 

“ Listen ! ” said Rosalie, by and by ; “ what’s 
that? I keep hearing it.” 

To the left of us, near and far, clear and faint, 
came hellos, whistles, and calls. 

“ It sounds like driving cows,” said Louie. 

“ There must be a whole pack of them,” I said, 
nervously. 

“ Let’s hurry faster,” said Rosalie ; and we al- 
most ran. 

We heard women’s voices and boys*. We did 
not understand what they were calling, and did 
not stop to find out, but hastened from that 
dangerous neighborhood. The underbrush kept 
growing thinner, until it ceased altogether, and 
we came to a pleasant, open grove, full of danc- 
ing sun and shadow. Here the brook ended, 
or rather began, in a spring, which was set in fern 
and jewel-weed and overspread by a splendid oak- 
tree. Beyond and beneath the oak, on level, 
mossy ground, was laid a large table-cloth covered 
226 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


with good things ; and on guard by it, her back 
against the bole of the tree, sat a little old lady 
with an anxious look on her good-natured face. 
I knew at once that it must be old lady Lord. 

“ Mercy me ! ” she cried, springing up, and 
staring at us. “ What a start you give me ! Whose 
young ones be you ? ” And then, as her gaze fell 
on Louie, she exclaimed: “Well, I give up, if 
it ain’t the little Baker girl ! Why, Sissy, dear, 
where you been ? The whole parcel of folks is 
out hunting for ye.” 

“ I got lost,” Louie answered, “ and Rosalie 
and Lucy found me.” 

“We were coming to the raspberrying,” Rosa- 
lie explained. “ Mother wouldn’t take us, so 
we thought we’d come ourselves.” 

“ Who is your mother ? ” asked old lady Lord. 

“ Mrs. Reed,” Rosalie answered. 

“You don’t say!” ejaculated old lady Lord. 
She gazed at us, with a twinkle in her eye and a 
pucker on her lips. “ Come on your own hook, 
did ye ? Well, you be spunky,” she said at 
length. “ Ain’t you all tuckered out ? ” 

“ I’m hungry,” said Rosalie. 

“ Of course you be,” said old lady Lord, “ and 
you shall set right down and eat. Never mind 
if the folks ain’t here ; they’ll be along soon.” 

227 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


She came to us, patted us kindly, and led 
us up to the feast. “ You’re damp,” she said; 
<c you’d best set on the sunny side and get dry. 

“ But first,” she added, “ we’ll give one or two 
calls, all together ; and then you fall to and fill 
up.” 

We all — old lady Lord, Louie, Rosalie, and 
I — lifted our voices in several high, quavering 
calls. “ Come back ! Come ba — ck ! ” we cried. 
Then we sat down, and I took stock of the good 
things before us, casting about for the one delicacy 
that I had set my heart on, the three-cornered 
green-apple turnovers, ruffled all ’round the edges. 

There were pickles and cheese and bologna 
sausage and green cucumbers and boiled eggs ; 
there were ham sandwiches and slices of mutton 
and corned beef ; there were dough-nuts and cup 
custards, and lemon pie frosted on top, and buns 
with plums in them, and red jelly tarts ; there 
were sponge cake and marbled cake and ribbon 
cake and fruit cake and yellow cake and frosted 
cake ; there were cookies and jumbles and ginger- 
bread ; there were blueberry turnovers and rasp- 
berry turnovers and apple turnovers, none of 
which had ruffled edges, but were plain, ordinary 
turnovers, cut after the usual pattern, with com- 
monplace thumb-marks around the rims. 

228 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


“ Why don't you take holt ? ’’ old lady Lord 
asked me, as I sat looking, searchingly and in 
evident disappointment. “ Have a sandwich, 
dear." 

I shook my head. 

“ Then a bun. Why, you must be hungry. 
Or a roll. Don't you like rolls ? Here's a rusk. 
Do eat, child. Have a dough-nut, do." 

I shook my head. I had made up my mind 
to have ruffled turnovers, and if I could not have 
them, I did not care for anything at all. 

She looked at me in amazement. “ Well, if 
you ain't the beatum ! " she said. “ For pity's 
sake, what do you want ? " 

I told her that Kate Jones's mother was going 
to bring green-apple turnovers, made with three 
corners, and ruffles all 'round the edges, and that 
I wanted one of those. 

She laughed. <c It's a good thing to know 
what you want," said she, “ and it’s another 
thing to get it. I ain’t seen any of them sing’lar 
turnovers. They may be in some basket that's 
been forgot. I’ll go look. I guess that Jones 
girl was jokin', but if there's any such turnovers as 
that around here I’d like a sight of ’em myself." 

Accordingly she went away to the teams to 
hunt for the possible basket. The teams were 
229 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


along the edges of the field, where the horses 
could browse on the bushes. She did not know 
which was Mrs. Jones’s team, so she began at 
the first one and hunted all down the line. At 
length she discovered a tin pail stowed away 
under a seat, and opened it. 

“ My stars ! ” she cried. She brought it for- 
ward, and lifted out, one after another, three 
dozen of the most delicious-looking turnovers 
that ever I set eyes on in all the days of my 
life, before or since. They were small and all 
of a size ; they were cut three-cornered, and were 
plump, flaky, and golden brown ; and the edges 
were fluted into crisp ruffles, a quarter of an inch 
deep, all goldeny browny and shiny and perfectly 
nibblifferous. It makes my mouth water yet, 
merely to remember them. 

They were packed with soft brown paper be- 
tween, to keep them from breaking. Old lady 
Lord unwrapped them and smilingly laid them 
before us. 

We each took one. 

“ That’s right,” she said to me ; “ and now 
you’ve got suited, keep at it. You’ve certainly 
got good taste ; them’s the puttiest things in the 
way of pie I ever see. Mis’ Jones deserves a 
meddle.” 


230 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP ” TIME 


We needed no urging; we did keep at it. 
It makes me ashamed to think that we were so 
selfish, but it is a sober fact — one after another, 
those three dozen turnovers disappeared. They 
were so appetizing, and we were so hungry ; but 
it did not once occur to us that they had not 
been made solely for us. We did not even offer 
any to old lady Lord. But all the while she 
chuckled as at some great joke. And far in the 
distance we could hear the calls and halloos of the 
people who were hunting for Louie. 

Old lady Lord kept laughing, till I said to my- 
self, “ She’s the laughingest old lady I ever saw.” 

But by and by she began to look anxious again. 

“ I declare,” she said, <c I thought some of ’em 
would be back before now. It’s too bad : there’s 
Mis’ Baker almost distracted ; and everybody is 
goin’ without their victuals, and wastin’ time, and 
gettin’ all wore out. I guess we’d best give an- 
other call, children.” 

We called again, but had no response. 

“ I don’t believe it’s any use to say c come 
back,”’ said I; “they’ll think that it’s somebody 
calling for Louie. We ought to holler something 
different, so that they’ll take notice of it.” 

“ Sure enough,” said old lady Lord ; “ but 
what shall we holler ? ” 


231 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ r 11 holler c fire,' " I said, “ and Louie can 
holler c thieves/ and Rosalie can holler c murder/ 
You needn't at all ; we'll do it for you." 

“ Well, so do ; I guess that'll fetch 'em," 
said old lady Lord. And she laughed again. 

So we screamed those three words, over and 
over. We said them in all sorts of ways. First 
I would call, “ Fire ! " and then Louie would 
sing out, “ Thieves ! " and Rosalie, “ Murder ! " 
Then I would shout, cc Fire, fire, fire ! " and the 
other two would come in with, “ Thieves, thieves, 
thieves ! " cc Murder, murder, murder ! " Then 
we would all call together. It was great fun. 

Before long the people came running back. 
They made an ado over Louie. She had to tell 
her story a dozen times or more. Some of the 
women and girls kissed her and called her, “ Poor 
dear child ! ” But her mother scolded and almost 
cried. 

Some young men took up our call, and their 
voices soon brought back the rest of the searchers. 
When Cousin Sally saw us, her face, which was 
flushed with heat and hurry, turned pale with 
astonishment, and for a moment she could not 
speak. Then she said : “ Where did you come 
from, pray ? " 

We hung our heads. It suddenly seemed to 

232 


WE HAVE A “ TIP-TOP ” TIME 


us that we had done wrong to come against her 
wishes. We felt foolish. Also, I suddenly felt 
conscious of our disreputable appearance : of our 
limp, soiled dresses, our muddy shoes and stock- 
ings, Rosalie’s tangled hair, full of pine spills and 
bits of twig, my swollen face and red flannel 
throat, our scratched, mosquito-bitten hands ; 
and I should have liked to vanish. 

“ What business had you to follow me ? ” 
said Cousin Sally. 

“ Now, Sally Reed,” cried old lady Lord, 
<c don’t you find a mite of fault with them poor 
lambs. Three mortal hours have they been a- 
roamin’ these woods, and it’s a mercy they’re 
here at all.” 

We plucked up heart at once. 

(< We came near being killed by a cow,” said 
Rosalie, bidding for everybody else’s sympathy. 

But everybody else seemed to find this infor- 
mation amusing. The women and girls laughed 
and the young men haw-hawed for some seconds. 
I did not see what there was to laugh at ; neither 
did Rosalie. “ We did,” she maintained with 
spirit ; “ we did come near getting killed by a 
cow. Didn’t we, Lucy ? ” 

“ Yes, we did,” 1 answered, emphatically. 

They laughed again ; but one woman spoke 
233 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


up and said : “ I don’t know as there’s anything 
to laugh at, after all. I’m scared to death of a 
cow.” 

“ So be I,” somebody else confessed. 

“ I always run when I see one,” another woman 
admitted. 

And would you believe it ? — more than half 
the women there were afraid of cows. Even 
those who did not mind their own were “ skittish” 
of strangers. Some of them went so far as to tie 
their own cows’ legs when they milked. 

“This was an awful big cow,” said Rosalie, 
determined to impress them. “She was three 
times as big as our Fannie. Wasn’t she, Lucy? ” 

“ Yes,” I responded. “ And she was fiery 
red. She came down like the Assyrian. Once I 
thought sure she had me, but I put all my mind 
into my legs, and the first thing I knew I was 
safe in the bushes.” 

They had sat down to lunch by this time. 
Miss Mayberry had come, with those of her pu- 
pils who were good enough to go to school. 
She sat with the big girls, the young men and 
boys, at one end of the table-cloth. Kitty was 
there, and Mealy What’s-her-name. A girl of 
about Molly’s age, with curly hair and laugh- 
ing eyes, nodded to Rosalie, and Rosalie said : 
234 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


“ There, Lucy, that's Emma Ellen.” The boy 
who rode on the hay was there, too, and so were 
all the big girls whom I had seen at Sunday- 
school. The smaller children were scattered 
about among the women. I was between old 
lady Lord and Sarah Googins, or “ that lady,” as 
Rosalie and I called her. Louie and Rosalie 
were between Cousin Sally and Mrs. Baker. I 
saw Mrs. Low, also, a little way down the line. 

The good things were passed to us, but we 
kept declining. At first this was not noticed 
particularly. For we were busy telling our ad- 
ventures, and could not be expected to talk and 
eat both at the same time. They said that it 
was the red flannel on my throat that excited the 
cow, and somebody asked how I got my cold. 
Then Cousin Sally, who, I could see, was a little 
ashamed of me, took occasion to give the various 
reasons for my sorry condition. I was a delicate 
child, she said, and everything took right hold of 
me. Whereupon somebody remarked that bees 
usually did take right hold of anybody, delicate 
or not. And at that they laughed and haw- 
hawed again. 

Then “ that lady ” told her version of the bee- 
bite story. She said that I was “ real spunky,” 
and “ didn't make much fuss, considering.” But 
235 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


at this, the boy who rode on the hay exclaimed : 
“ Oh, Mis' Googins ! Why, she yelled like 
sixty ! ” And he began to sing his hateful song 
about the busy bee’s making little girls holler. 

While he had his mouth open on the word 
“ holler,” a young man opposite him threw a 
pickle into it. This pleased me, for I detested 
that boy. Besides, the pickle went straight as a 
dart, and I admired dexterity. I observed the 
young man with interest. He seemed to be the 
leader of the festive young folk. I observed that 
he and another young man kept passing things 
to Miss Mayberry, and that she laughed at every- 
thing they said. His name was Jo. Could he 
be Jo Paine, I wondered? 

But my attention was divided, for the elders 
were talking about me. They were advising 
Cousin Sally as to what she had better do with 
me when she got me home. One said to soak 
my feet in mustard water and give me salts and 
senna ; another said that a bath with cayenne in 
the water would be better than mustard ; another 
said that a good sweat was the best thing in the 
world. They recommended aconite and bella- 
donna, thoroughwort tea, horehound syrup, 
Ayer’s cherry pectoral, boiled molasses with but- 
ter and vinegar in it, nitre, flaxseed and lemon, 
236 


WE HAVE A “TIPTOP” TIME 


and licorice. One said that I ought to be packed 
in cold water ; another thought hot water prefer- 
able to cold ; another said that lard was better 
than either ; and another said to use cod liver oil 
outside and in. And Cousin Sally, though she 
did not exactly promise to do all these things to 
me, seemed disposed to ; for she kept agreeing 
with everyone — saying, “ Why, that would be 
good,” or, cc There ! why didn’t I think of that 
before ? ” so that I began to feel alarmed. 

Suddenly I heard one of the girls say : “ Come, 
boys, it’s time to sing.” 

The young man who threw the pickle stood up 
and bowed. “ Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, 
“ I’m going to give you a surprise.” 

He went to one of the wagons, and fetched a 
case with a green flannel cover, from which he 
took a banjo. This seemed to be a great surprise, 
and everybody exclaimed and questioned about 
it. They all had to handle it, too, and pick at 
the strings. I did not go to look at it ; I was 
too bashful. 

“ I wondered what that was,” said old lady 
Lord. “ I run foul of it when I was huntin’ for 
them turnovers ! ” 

“ Turnovers ! ” cried Kate Jones. cc Ma, you’ve 
forgotten your turnovers ! ” 

237 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“No, I ain’t,” replied her mother, in a com- 
placent way. “ I’ve been a-savin’ them to top off 
on. They ain’t intended for you young ones, 
neither ; I made them turnovers for us old folks. 
A sort of special extry dest rt,” she ended, smil- 
ing around at the expectant faces. 

“ I took a terrible lot of pains with ’em,” she 
added ; “ they’ll melt in your mouth, they’re so 
tender.” 

Rosalie, Louie, and I looked at one another, 
and felt embarrassed ; and I shouldn’t wonder if 
old lady Lord felt somewhat the same way, but 
she concealed her feelings pretty well, and pre- 
tended to be enjoying the joke as much as ever 
while she told about it. Mrs. Jones did not seem 
amused. “ Do you mean to say,” she said, look- 
ing severely at me, “that you had your mind 
fastened on them turnovers before the very apples 
was picked off’n the trees?” 

“ Yes,’m,” I answered in a very, very faint voice. 

She continued to gaze sternly at me. “Well,” 
she said, at length, “I wish I’d ’a’ knowed it — 
that’s all.” 

“ I don’t wonder they can’t eat anything,” some- 
body said. 

Mrs. Baker and Cousin Sally looked ashamed. 
“ I’m mortified to death,” said Cousin Sally. “ I 
238 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


can’t think what got into Louie,” said Mrs. Ba- 
ker; “she never did such a thing before.” 

“ Never mind,” said somebody else ; “ they’ve 
had a good set-down for once in their lives. I 
don’t believe they’ll ever have such a feast again.” 

“To think,” said a disappointed one, “of the 
pains that was put into them delicious things, just 
for three little pigs to gobble up.” 

I was burning from head to foot, and Louie 
looked as I felt. Rosalie also was uncomfortable, 
but she did not seem so overwhelmed with shame. 
“ That lady,” who, I am sure, had taken a fancy 
to me (though why she did I don’t understand, 
for certainly she had not seen me under very fa- 
vorable circumstances), whispered in my ear that 
I mustn’t lay it to heart. And she added, that 
she had brought the honey-comb, but thought she 
wouldn’t put it on the table ; it was in her buggy, 
and she would tuck it into Cousin Sally’s before 
we went home. 

But even this did not sweeten my disgrace. 
Life had grown dark to me ; I felt that I was one 
of the meanest sinners in the world. It was a 
relief when Jo Paine, strumming his banjo, drew 
attention from us to himself. 

Now this part of the picnic was so entertaining 
that, try as hard as I might, I could not even be- 
239 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


gin to give you the least idea of it. For the time 
being I forgot my shame and self-consciousness, 
and enjoyed the music, laughing and clapping 
with everybody else. The Paine boys had good 
voices and a rollicking way with them, and the 
tunes that they sang were lively. Everybody 
clapped everything, and they cried : “ Splendid, 
boys ! ” “ Give us another ! ” “ Keep right on ! ” 
<c That’s the best yet ! ” and so forth and so on, 
in that complimentary and encouraging way. The 
Paine boys grew gayer and gayer, and the banjo 
— I don’t know how to express that ; “ tinkle ” is 
too tame and “ rattle ” is too romping. But it 
was so full of frolic that before long most of the 
young people were dancing on the grass. As 
to the doubling-uppers, which came last of all, 
those were so comical that some of the hearers 
did have to hold their sides, they laughed so 
hard, and old lady Lord wiped merry tears from 
her eyes. I cannot recollect a word of them ; but 
it makes me laugh to myself, even now, to re- 
member how I laughed then. 

Of course, after a while (it was a long while, 
though) we went to work raspberrying. There 
were baskets and baskets and pails and pails full 
already, set away in shady places, but there were 
also baskets and baskets and pails and pails yet 
240 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


to be filled. I could not find any bushes as 
heavily laden as I had expected, nor was the 
ground red anywhere, but the berries were indeed 
very thick, large, and luscious. 

Rosalie and I did not pick many. We were 
tired, I suppose. But we made a trial, and got 
our hands well scratched with the briars. After 
Cousin Sally and Kitty had taken about a dozen 
thorns out of our flesh, they became impatient. 
“ I believe I shall fly ! " said Cousin Sally. “ Do 
go and sit down somewhere, and stay there." So, 
seeing that old lady Lord had quit work, we went 
to her. 

“You poor dears !” she exclaimed, when she 
saw our scratched hands. “ You look as if you'd 
been to the wars. You're havin' a hard time." 

“ Oh, no, 'm," I returned ; “ we're having a 
splendid time. You don't mind getting scratched 
at a raspberrying.” 

“ Then you're willin' to bleed in a good 
cause ? " she said, smiling. 

“ I don't mind bleeding,” said Rosalie. “ I 
had a kitten once ; she made me bleed every day." 

Old lady Lord laughed outright. “ Kittens 
and raspberries," she said, “ I don't know which 
is the scratchiest. My little granddaughter has a 
kitten, a pretty, white kitten." 

241 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Lots of folks have them/* said Rosalie. 
“ The man-that-gave-us-a-lift’s little girl has one. 
She has a wax doll, too, and she is going to have 
a blue silk parasol. I wish I had a wax doll 
and a parasol.” 

“ Who is that ? ” asked old lady Lord, look- 
ing interested. 

“ Her name is Ruby Pearl,” I answered, say- 
ing the precious name slowly and with relish. 
“ Her father gave us a ride this morning. He 
came from Windham. He had butter and eggs 
to sell. He was going to buy Ruby Pearl a blue 
silk parasol.” 

“ You don’t say !” cried old lady Lord. “ Did 
you ride with Freeman ? That was my son Free- 
man. Ruby Pearl is my little granddaughter. I 
want to know if you rode with Freeman ! Well, 
well ! ” 

Into the midst of our conversation there came 
a deep bark, and lo — Rover ! He bounded out 
of the woods, straight up to Rosalie. 

“Why, Rover! Hello! — Rover!” she 
cried, springing to meet him. And then she 
called : “ Mother ! Kitty ! here’s Rover ! Rover 
has come to the raspberrying ! ” 

Rover seemed overjoyed. All his dignity 
had disappeared. He licked Rosalie’s face ; and 
242 


WE HAVE A “TIP-TOP” TIME 


when Prince came frisking to him, he lapped 
Prince’s face also ; and he gave short, happy 
barks. 

Cousin Sally and Kitty left their work hastily. 

“Your grandmother sent him ! ” exclaimed 
Cousin Sally. “ She thinks that you are lost ! 
She sent him to find you! She must be worried 
to death ! We must go home at once ! ” 

“ Good Rover ! Good dog ! ” said Kitty, 
patting him. 

“Well, that’s a dog worth havin',” said old 
lady Lord. 

Rosalie caressed him. “ Poor fellow,” she 
said ; “ did he get his poor back all hurted in the 
bushes, Rover ? Good doggie ! Dear Rover ! ” 
And she and he and Prince had a loving time, 
kissing each other repeatedly. Cousin Sally 
hurried away to get the team, and Kitty col- 
lected our baskets. 

But we were not the only ones to go home 
then, for all at once something happened that 
broke up the raspberrying. Cousin Sally was 
just leading Charlie from his browsing-place, when 
a clap of thunder startled us, and we saw with 
consternation that dark clouds were overspread- 
ing the sky. Immediately there was a scene of 
hurry and confusion : people came running from 
243 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


all directions ; teams were swiftly unhitched and 
harnessed up ; baskets and pails were loaded on ; 
children were called, commanded, and scolded ; 
nervous horses were reasoned with and soothed; 
mistakes were made ; berries were spilled, yet, in 
the main, everybody was gay and good-humored. 
Still, it all took time, and before we were ready 
to go, big drops were splashing down. 

The good - bys were hasty but hearty. 
“ Haven't we had a good time ? ” someone 
would call. Then somebody else would answer : 
“ Tip-top ! Tip-top ! ” And so we went off 
whirling. 


244 



CHAPTER XXI 

IN WHICH LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 

R OSALIE and I were stowed in behind with 
the baskets, because, after quick consulta- 
tion with Kitty, Cousin Sally decided to call at 
the Corn-shop for Molly. 

“ We shall be wringing wet anyway,” she said ; 
“ a few drops more or less won’t make much 
difference. And Molly might as well get wet 
in coming home, where she can change her 
clothes, and help me with the raspberries, as in 
going over to Luce Pride’s, where, likely as not, 
she would sit with damp skirts all the evening, 
wasting time. 

“ The boys,” she added, “ will have to walk.” 
We headed the procession ; and oh, what a 
procession it was ! For, as Rosalie and I sat 
curled up in our close quarters, holding on tight 
to keep from being jounced out, we could look 
back and see team after team — a regular cavalcade 
245 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


— tearing along in our wake. The wood road 
was gloomily dark, but every few moments a 
lightning-flash would illume some jolly, laughing 
phiz, or 'grim, determined countenance. We 
caught glimpses of young men with girls’ hand- 
kerchiefs tied around their necks, of girls with 
young men’s coats on, of sober children sand- 
wiched in with grown folk ; and we heard, be- 
tween the thunder-claps, an unbroken beat of 
hoofs and whirr of wheels. It made me think of 
a piece of poetry in the “ Standard Speaker ” : 

“ I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ; ” 

though, to be sure, there were more than three of 
us, and galloping is nothing to the way we went 
— we fairly spun. 

Through the woods we rushed, out into the 
main road, which, being wider, was not so dark as 
the other, although it looked dismal enough be- 
tween its sombre walls of pine and spruce. Here 
the procession divided, part chasing us toward 
Pride’s Corner, the rest racing off Duck-Pond 
way. 

Down by the Corn-shop everything looked 
dreary. The river was enough to make one shud- 
der, it was so wild and black. And all the trees 
drooped weepingly. We drove up to the door, and 
246 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


Kitty went in, coming out again in a few minutes 
with Molly and Dick. Dick helped the girls into 
the buggy, and he was very pleasant with them 
and Cousin Sally, but he cast indignant, reproach- 
ful glances at Rosalie and me. When Cousin 
Sally said, “ I’m sorry that you boys must walk 
through this rain and mud, but I don’t see how 
we can help it,” he replied, crossly, that it was a 
good deal to ask of a feller, but he supposed 
“ those two young ones must be pompered.” 
Then he turned the team for us, and away we 
dashed again. 

Rover and Prince ran beside us ; that is. 
Rover did, but Prince kept getting left and hav- 
ing to make up for it. He looked weary and 
woe-begone, but Rover bounded along easily. 

The rain did not hurt the raspberries, they 
were so tightly covered, but it almost washed 
Rosalie and me out of our sockets. We held on, 
however, and now and then smiled at each other 
(rather feebly), to show that we were not afraid. 
On the bridge a vivid flash made Charlie rear, 
and we nearly pitched headforemost. When 
Cousin Sally had coaxed him back to his quad- 
ruped condition and everything was going on as 
before, Kitty half turned, and spoke down to 
us : “ Are you there all right ? ” 

247 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


cc Gracious ! ” cried Cousin Sally's voice, from 
'way around in front ; “ I never thought of them ! 
They might have been killed ! ” And then she 
called angrily to us : “ Why didn’t you scream ? ” 

So when Charlie reared again we screamed. 
The next few minutes are utterly indescribable. 
When we had all recovered from them, Cousin 
Sally called, more angrily than before : cc Don’t 
you scream again ! I’ve enough to contend with, 
without that ! ” 

Aunt Eunice was standing at the door when 
we whizzed through the yard and into the barn ; 
the next instant she was in the barn with us. 
She did not stop to go by way of the shed, but 
came straight through the rain. She was almost 
crying with anxiety ; her voice was trembly ; her 
hands shook as she lifted Rosalie and me out of 
the buggy ; and she hugged and kissed Rosalie 
in a way that struck me with wonder, it was so 
different from her ordinary way. 

After we were in the house, dryly clothed, sit- 
ting around the kitchen stove, toasting our toes, 
and sipping hot ginger-tea, we heard Aunt Eu- 
nice’s story. 

She did not miss Rosalie and me until dinner- 
time, when we did not answer her call. She 
waited awhile, and then hunted for us. Then 
248 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


she sent Rover into the woods across the road, 
but she was not really alarmed till he came back 
without us. He began to act strangely, smelling 
the ground, wagging his tail, looking up into her 
face, and barking, as if he were trying to say 
something ; so she said : “ Go and find them. 
Rover.” That was at about three o’clock, and 
since then she had been hunting the place over 
and worrying. 

Then it was our turn, and we had, as you know, 
a good deal to tell. Supper was ready, the tea- 
kettle was singing, the rain beat unceasingly 
against the windows, and we all talked on. Aunt 
Eunice lighted a lamp, and still we talked. But 
suddenly Prince started up, barking, and we knew 
that the boys had come. 

He made such an unusual fuss about it, even 
for him, that all of us ran to the window to see 
what the matter was ; and then we did not wonder, 
for — such a sight ! Up the grassy border of the 
drive-way Dick was coming — turning handsprings. 

At the steps he paused, laboriously mounted 
them on his hands, turned a somersault into the 
kitchen, and sank, exhausted, wet, and muddy, 
into a chair. 

“ I didn’t know — as I should — hold out — to 
get here,” he panted, with a reproachful look at 
249 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Rosalie and me ; “ my legs — gave out — ’way 
down — by Sam Cobb’s biscuit.” 

All through supper Dick behaved ridiculously ; 
and not Dick alone, but Bert and Phil as well. 
They acted like little boys. No; worse, far worse 
than that. Dick was the worst of the three. I am 
not going to describe his jokes and antics, because, 
although they made us merry at the time, they 
would not sound funny on paper, they were so 
silly. When at length Cousin Sally told him of 
it — “ Oh, Dick,” she said, “ you are so silly ! You 
are always frivolous, but to-night you are more 
absurd than ever” — he replied, that he realized it, 
but that he couldn’t seem to help it— lightning 
got into him on the way home. He always 
suffered in a thunder-storm, he said, but this time 
he was out in it so long (and here he gave one of 
those reproachful looks at Rosalie and me) that 
more lightning than usual got into him ; he ex- 
pected it would be popping off all night. 

What struck me even more than Dick’s folly, 
was Philip’s foolishness, because hitherto Philip 
had been so unvaryingly well-behaved. But 
now, when Rosalie climbed up in his lap and 
coaxed him a little, he put his thumb in his 
mouth, fixed his eyes on the ceiling, and recited 
after her : 


250 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


tl * Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. 

A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked. 

If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. 

Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked ? ’ ” 

Try it yourself, and imagine how funny it 
looked. 

After supper, Cousin Sally said : 

“Now, I have those raspberries to fix, and I 
can’t spare the time to milk ; somebody else will 
have to do it. You had better, Molly ; Bert will 
have his hands full, taking care of Charlie and 
the buggy. After I get the berries cooked 
enough I want you to help fill the jars, but you'll 
have time to milk." Then she went out of the 
room. 

“ I don't want to milk," said Molly ; “ I 
want to press my skirt, so that it will be fit to 
wear to-morrow. You do it, Kitty, will you? 
You can, if you want to ; you know how. Come, 
I’ll lend you my ear-rings if you will." 

For a moment Kitty did not speak; then she 
said: “I don't want to milk; I'm too tired; 
I've worked awful hard all day. Phil, why can't 
you ? I'll tell you how. You ought to learn, 
anyway ; it’s always handy to know how to do 
things." 

Philip laughed. “ I think I’d just as lief not 

251 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


know how to milk,” he replied, in his moderate 
way. “ Besides, I have on my good clothes ; 
you don’t want to work when you are dressed 
up, you know.” 

“ How would it hurt your clothes ? The 
idea ! ” said Kitty, scornfully. 

“ Sure enough,” said Dick. “ As if any clothes 
were too good to milk dear Fannie in ! ” 

“Well,” said Philip, “I have a bone in my 
leg, and I’m afraid that dear Fannie might break 
it.” 

“ Then you, Dick ? ” Kitty begged. 

“ All right,” said Dick, airily. “ I have my 
best clothes on, too, but I’d love to oblige you, 
Kitty. 

“I don’t know the first thing about it,” he went 
on, “but I’m anxious to learn, and if you’ll all 
come out and tell me how, I’ll see what I can do.” 
And he added, with one of those heart-rending, 
resentful looks at Rosalie and me : “ All my bones 
are broken now — walking ’way up from the 
Corn-shop to-night.” 

So we gleefully trooped to the barn to teach 
Dick how to milk. (Of course Molly stopped 
to put her irons on.) 

Now he did know how, perfectly well, for he 
was a farmer’s son, and had been brought up to 
' 252 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


milk cows, but he professed the densest igno- 
rance. We stood, sat, and scooched around. 
The lantern lit our faces, making them look white 
and bright amid the shadows. 

“ Which part of her do you milk ? " he asked, 
guilelessly. 

“ I always wring it out of her horns, ,, said 
Bert. 

Dick pretended to twist Fannie's horns, gravely 
holding the pail up, but not a drop came. Both 
he and Fannie looked surprised. 

“ I think I've heard that you pump the tail,” 
suggested Philip. 

Dick went around to the tail, and worked it up 
and down. Fannie objected, trying to shove him 
away. 

“ Oh, come ; it's too bad," Molly protested. 

“ That isn't the right Way at all," said Kitty. 
“ The right way is to squeeze the cow." 

Dick began to hug Fannie. He threw his 
arms around her neck. cc Fannie, darling," he 
said, in a wheedling tone, “ give Dicky-bird some 
milk." 

Fannie did not know what to make of this fool- 
ery. “ Moo ! " she said, angrily, wrenching her 
head away. 

Molly was uneasy. <c Don't, Dick," she said. 

253 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Do milk properly, and get through. I’m afraid 
we shall spoil her.” 

So Dick did milk properly, though every once 
in a while he would turn his head and simper and 
smirk at us ; but Fannie held her grudge, and no 
sooner was the last drop in the pail than she de- 
liberately lifted her foot and kicked pail and Dick 
to the floor. 

H e was drenched. But even this did not sub- 
due him ; he only turned the empty pail upside 
down, seated himself, pulled a huge red bandanna 
handkerchief from his pocket, and began to cry. 

We tried to comfort him. 

“ I’ll give you my pie every day for a week, 
Dick,” said Kitty. 

“ So will I,” said Rosalie. 

“ I will, too,” said I. 

“ I’ll never forget how you look, Dick,” said 
Molly, laughing. 

“ You’re the prettiest thing this side of China, 
Dick,” said Bert. “ If I looked as pretty as 
that I should want to go right down through, and 
see if they had anything there to beat me.” 

<c I never thought you a milksop, Dick,” said 
Philip, “ but at present you have every appear- 
ance of being one.” 

Dick sobbed on, and dolefully shook his head. 

254 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


“ It — it will take — more than pie — and praises — 
to — to mend my bones — and — and improve my 
appearance/’ he said, brokenly. 

“ What can we do for you ? ” asked Molly. 

“ If you — would only — lend me — your — your 
ear-rings — ” he said, between his sobs. 

Molly looked out of the corner of her eye at 
Kitty, and innocently asked : “ Why, how could 
you wear ear-rings ? ” 

“ Oh,” he answered, also looking at Kitty out 
of the corner of his eye, “ I’d — I’d — find a way 
— to wear them.” 

Kitty did not look cornerwise ; she faced them 
squarely. She was blushing, but her eyes blazed. 

“You mean old things!” she burst forth. 
“ You’ve known about it all the time ! Of course 
I ought not to have taken them ; but all the 
same, I despise people who twit ! ” 

Molly looked a little ashamed. Dick quivered 
with grief. Then Philip spoke up, like a good 
peacemaker : 

“ Another kind of wrings would be more be- 
coming to you, Dick,” he said. “ I’ll see what 
I can do for you, if you like.” 

“ I don’t want your — jewelry — dear boy,” said 
Dick ; “ there’s — there’s only — one thing — that 
would do me any good.” 

255 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


“ Name it,” said Philip. 

“ If you’d — only — take me — up in your lap — 
and — and say — Peter — Piper — picked a — peck o’ 
— boo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo ! ” 

“ All right,” said Philip, when he could make 
himself heard through our laughter, “ I will, when 
you get on something dry.” 

Dick began to sob louder. “ All — all — all my 
clothes — boo-hoo — are in — in soak ! Boo-hoo- 
hoo-hoo-hoo ! ” he cried, in anguish. 

Oh, dear, how we did laugh ! Fannie mooed, 
Charlie gave a shrill neigh, and Prince barked 
excitedly ; and of course this did not lessen the 
fun. Into the midst of it came Cousin Sally. 

“ Why, what’s this ? ” she said, sharply. 
“ What does this mean ? ” 

There was a sudden hush. Then Molly 
spoke, her voice unsteady with mirth and dread : 

“Why, you see, mother, Dick was milk- 
ing ” 

“ Oh ! ” said Cousin Sally. “ Dick was milk- 
ing, was he P ” 

cc I was treating her with the greatest respect 
that ever was,” said Dick, in an injured tone. 
“ She never said a word till I got through, and 
then she up and let me have it, just out of 
spite.” 


256 


LIGHTNING GETS INTO DICK 


“ A likely story,” said Cousin Sally. “ Fannie 
is not spiteful ; she is the gentlest creature in 
the world. You needn’t tell me, Dick Jones; I 
know you provoked her.” 

“The fact is, Mrs. Reed,” said Dick, ear- 
nestly, flaunting his red bandanna, “ that cow 
has always been jealous of me, I’m so good- 
looking.” 

Cousin Sally gazed at him. “ Her heart must 
be at peace now,” she said ; and then she, too, 
was seized with a fit of laughter. 

I was astounded. That serene Aunt Eunice 
could worry and be overcome by her feelings, 
that Rover could depart from dignity, that Philip 
could be foolish — these facts had strongly im- 
pressed me ; but that fretty Cousin Sally could 
stand and laugh, in the face of such waste of 
milk, was the most amazing fact of all. But con- 
sistency is a jewel that isn’t set in everybody’s 
birth - month ring. And anyway, you can’t 
expect a person’s ways to be like a paper doll’s 
dresses — all cut to fit the same attitude. Or 
perhaps I should say, you can’t expect people 
to be like paper dolls — each one fixed “just so ” 
for life : they will vary now and then ; and that, 
you know, a paper doll never does. 


257 



CHAPTER XXII 
IN WHICH I EXIT 

HAT night I had uncomfortable dreams. 



A I dreamed, for one thing, that old lady 
Lord and I were up a tree, which Dick was shak- 
ing with all his might, while Fannie stood at the 
foot of it, lashing her tail and mooing terribly. 
So it isn’t to be wondered at that I felt dull the 
next day. I coughed a good deal, and did not 
want any breakfast. 

Rosalie was not very bright, either ; she was 
tired and out of humor. Cousin Sally was tired 
and out of humor, too. Even Kitty was less 
sunny than usual. Aunt Eunice herself was 
somewhat under the weather. 

For the weather certainly was trying. It was 
hot, damp, muggy, and sticky. The flowers 
hung their heads, the birds had nothing whatever 
to say, the hens were moody. Only the insects 


258 


I EXIT 


seemed to think all things ordered for the best, 
and they made enough noise about it to give all 
the rest of the universe a headache. 

“Such a time as I’ve had scrubbing up that 
milk,” Cousin Sally grumbled. “ Bert didn’t 
half do it. And he didn’t hurt himself over the 
buggy. And the dresses that those children wore 
yesterday are a sight to behold. And the cur- 
rants are just ripe enough for jelly, but this is no 
kind of day for jelly-making. And there’s a 
mess of peas that must be picked, whether or no. 
And Dick’s clothes will have to be washed out at 
once. And there’s cooking to be done if old 
lady Lord is coming to-morrow ; I want her to 
find as good a table as Luce Pride sets. And, to 
crown all, Emma Ellen is coming down this after- 
noon, to stay over night.” 

“ Emma Ellen coming ! ” exclaimed Kitty. 
“ Oh, goody ! ” 

£C I like Emma Ellen,” Cousin Sally responded, 
“ but you know well enough that when Emma 
Ellen comes you young folks go wild. Dick 
and Emma Ellen together are more than I care 
to look forward to, on such a day as this.” 

“ Don’t look forward to it, then,” said Aunt 
Eunice. “ c Sufficient unto the day is the evil 
thereof.’ Make Bert do the buggy over. You 
259 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


should have left the milk for him and Dick to 
clean up ; it isn’t so hard for them as for you. 
Perhaps to-morrow will be a good jelly day. I’ll 
tend to Dick’s clothes and the dresses, while you 
pick the peas. Mehitable Lord doesn’t go to see 
her friends for what she can get to eat, and if we 
didn’t have anything but bread and milk nobody 
else would ever be the wiser. And as for Emma 
Ellen, you know that you enjoy her visits as 
much as the young folks do.” 

“ I’m going to stay home and help,” said Kitty. 

“ Indeed, you are not,” her mother returned. 
“ You are going to school, miss. One day dis- 
missed, another absent — how much schooling do 
you think you will get ? ” 

“ Do let me stay,” Kitty coaxed. 

“ No,” was her mother’s firm answer; “ you’ll 
go to school.” 

“ What time is Emma Ellen coming ? ” asked 
Kitty. 

“ I told her to be sure to come early,” said 
Cousin Sally. 

After Kitty went to school, Rosalie and I sat 
around moping, not knowing what to do for 
amusement. Cousin Sally noticed our listlessness. 

“ What is the matter?” she asked. “ Can’t 
you find' anything to play ? ” 

260 


I EXIT 


“ Everything is played out,” I answered, with 
a cough. 

“ We're tired of everything,” Rosalie said, 
peevishly. 

Cousin Sally looked attentively at us. 

“You are what is played out; and I don't 
wonder,” she said. “ You must keep quiet 
to-day. Why don't you make some leaf dolls ? 
I used to make them when I was a little girl. 
You can't hurt yourselves doing that, and it will 
occupy you.” 

“ How did you make them P ” we asked. 

“ I can’t stop to make one for you, but I'll tell 
you how,” she said. “You take a little piece of 
stem, about so long, for a body, and tie a little 
piece across it for arms. Then you make a hole 
in the middle of a leaf, and slip it up over the stem, 
for a skirt, puckering it down — so — with your 
fingers. Then you slip another down over the 
head and arms, for a waist ; and you hold them 
together, while you tie a sash of grass around. 
Then you put on a flower-cap, and there you 
have your doll.” 

We went down to the roadside to get some 
suitable stems and leaves. Then we went up to 
the barn chamber to make the dolls. 

It was easy and interesting, and we made a 
261 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


good many, with different kinds of leaves for 
dresses, different kinds of grass for sashes, and 
different flowers or parts of flowers for caps. 
While I was at work on my seventeenth, I said, 
“ Rosalie, these are new beings.” 

“ What’s beings ? ” she asked. 

“ Why,” I hesitated, “ beings are — beings. 
You are a being, and I am. And Rover and 
Prince are ; and so are Fannie and Charlie. And 
there are other kinds of beings — Creatures and 
Things.” 

“ No, siree ! ” cried Rosalie. 

“ Yes, siree,” I insisted. 

“ No, siree,” she said again. <c Fannie is a 
cow, and Rover and Prince are dogs, and Charlie 
is a horse, and I am a girl, and these are just 
dolls. So there, now ! ” 

“ They are beings, too,” I repeated, as obstinate 
as she was. 

“ They are not ! ” she cried, and threw one at 
me. 

“ I was going to make up something about 
them to play,” I returned in an offended tone. 

“ I don’t care,” said Rosalie ; and then she 
asked : “ What were you going to make up ? ” 

“ Let’s play Fairy Godmother, and give a 
great feast to the new beings.” 

262 


I EXIT 


<c All right,” she responded ; “ so we will. 
But, Lucy, what can we have for the feast ? There 
isn't anything but raspberries, unless grandma 
will give us some cookies.” 

“ Oh, yes,” I replied ; “ there are blueberries, 
and bunchberries over in the woods, and this 
cough candy.” And I took from my pocket a 
piece of horehound candy, which Cousin Sally 
had given me. 

“ We can have lots of dishes,” I continued, 
“ and each dish can have a quality.” 

“ What's that ? ” she asked. 

“ It means,” I answered, hesitating, “ that when 
a new being chooses some dish to eat of she will 
have a fairy gift bestowed upon her. If she eats 
of one she will be beautiful, if she eats of another 
she will be the best dancer in the world, if she 
eats of another she will be rich, and so on. In 
fairy stories it is always the fairy godmothers who 
have the feast given to them, but it's just as well 
to do things different once in a while. I don't 
like to do the same things that everybody else 
does.” 

We started on a foraging expedition. When 
we returned we laid a long board tablewise on two 
small blocks of wood, and spread our feast upon 
it. We had the little dishes, and also used leaves 
263 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


for plates. We had platters of green apples, 
dishes of blueberries, huckleberries, raspberries, 
bunchberries, half-ripe choke-cherries, hollyhock 
cheeses, flag-root, and horehound candy, pitchers 
of raspberry sirup, and piles of checkerberry 
leaves, sorrel leaves, and molasses cookies. 

We arranged the leaf dolls at the sides of the 
table, and took our places, with Dolladine and 
Zareffa, at the head and foot. 

Each of the dishes had its quality ; there were 
beauty, heroism, grace, goodness, wisdom, riches, 
skill, etc. Each of the dolls was offered a choice 
of viands, and whatever she chose we ate for 
her. 

This took a good while, for although there was 
but little of each kind of food, we were very cere- 
monious and made much conversation — as be- 
came fairy godmothers. 

After the feast was over and all the new beings 
were endowed with qualities, we took them to a 
corner of the orchard, and left them there to found 
a nation. Then we went into the house, because 
it was dinner-time ; but we did not want anything 
to eat. 

At about half-past one, who should put in an 
appearance but Kitty, looking a little doubtful as 
to her probable reception, but also with an air of 
264 


I EXIT 


being ready for any emergency. “ Has Emma 
Ellen come yet?” she asked, as she walked into 
the kitchen. 

“ You’ve been dismissed ! ” cried her mother. 

“No, I haven’t — not exactly,” Kitty replied. 

“ Not exactly ? ” said her mother. 

“ No,” said Kitty. “ I knew that Miss May- 
berry wouldn’t let me off, because she has once 
before this week, so I wrote a note and put it on 
her desk at noon. I wrote that I was wanted at 
home, and couldn’t stop to tell why ; and then I 
skipped.” 

“ You’ll worry me to death,” said her mother. 
“ And you didn’t tell the truth, for you are not 
wanted at home.” 

“Yes, I am,” Kitty returned, cheerfully ; “you 
see if you don’t want me for something or other 
before the afternoon is out. And the children 
want me ; don’t you, children ? ” 

Emma Ellen did not come, after all ; but 
Cousin Sally did want Kitty before the afternoon 
was over, as you will soon see. 

Before the afternoon was over I began to feel 
ill. Cousin Sally felt of my head and hands, and 
looked worried. “ She is going to be sick, I 
know,” she said. 

“We must keep her quiet, and give her a 
265 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


dose of nitre when she goes to bed,” said Aunt 
Eunice, calmly. 

C£ Where do you feel worst, Lucy ? ” asked 
Cousin Sally, kneeling down beside me. 

I put my hand on my throat, then on my head, 
and then I put it on my stomach. “ There’s an 
awful funny feeling here,” I said, hoarsely ; “ I 
guess this is the worst, and it’s growing worsen” 

“ That’s strange,” said Cousin Sally. “ She 
didn’t eat any breakfast or dinner. It can’t be 
those turnovers ; they were rich, to be sure, but 
they would have hurt her before this if they had 
been going to hurt her at all. Besides, they 
didn’t hurt Rosalie. Have you eaten anything, 
Lucy ? ” 

“ Only the Fairy Godmothers’ Feast,” I an- 
swered. 

“ The what ? ” said Cousin Sally, looking 
blankly at me. 

“ The feast that we gave to the new beings,” I 
explained. But she still looked blank. 

“We made a feast for the leaf dolls,” said 
Rosalie. “ We had it up in the barn chamber. 
We didn’t eat everything, though.” 

“ What did you eat ? ” her mother asked, 
anxiously. 

Rosalie told off on her fingers : 

266 


I EXIT 


“ Blueberries, and huckleberries, and raspber- 
ries, and bunchberries, and choke-cherries, and 
cheeses, and cough candy, and cookies, and rasp- 
berry sirup, and we chewed a few sorrel leaves 
and checkerberry leaves, and just bit some flag- 
root and green apples.” 

Cousin Sally sat down on the floor in horror 
and dismay. “ You'll be sick next!” she cried. 
“ Mother, I shall carry Lucy home to-night; 
two sick ones are more than I can undertake. I 
will not be responsible for her any longer.” 

“ I don’t know but that I would,” said Aunt 
Eunice. 

They gave me some medicine that helped the 
funny feeling ; Aunt Eunice dressed me and 
packed my things ; Cousin Sally dressed herself 
and harnessed Charlie. “Tm glad that you are 
here, Kitty,” she said; “ you can look out for 
Lucy, and I sha’n’t have to come home alone.” 

“ I’m glad,” I said to Rosalie, “ that I’m going 
to see mother and grandma and grandpa and 
Bobby, but I wish I could see Philip. He was 
going to finish a story. And I want to see him, 
even without the story.” 

It was so late when we were ready, that instead of 
waiting for supper, Cousin Sally took something 
with her to eat on the way. I said good-by to 
267 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 


Rover and Prince as well as to Aunt Eunice and 
Rosalie, and we started. I leaned against Kitty 
and idly gazed as we sped along. It seemed queer 
to keep meeting the things that I had kept leaving 
behind when I rode out with Mr. Crowe. I 
silently bade farewell to them all — to the woods, 
the village, the school-house, the beautiful river 
with its green and blue reflections. The sun was 
sinking, and soon it disappeared, leaving the wide 
west glorious. The upper air was full of swallows; 
to me they looked like arrows darting across the 
sky. I have never forgotten it — that great wide 
sunset sky, full of darting arrows. 

Kitty chattered a good deal, but Cousin Sally 
was quiet. Once or twice she felt of my forehead 
and said : “ How do you feel now, Lucy ?” 

“Tired and sleepy,” I answered. “How long 
will it take to get there ?” 

“ Not long,” she returned. 

By the time we reached Deering bridge it was 
dusk, and the gas-lights were starting up, one by 
one, in the city. There were lights in windows 
here and there, also. The streets looked strange 
in the semi-darkness, as if we were riding into a 
place that I knew nothing about. “ It must seem 
like this when you travel,” I thought, “ or when 
you go on adventures to far kingdoms.” 

268 


I EXIT 


We drove up Green Street and through Cum- 
berland and Chestnut. Leaning back, I looked 
straight up, so that I could see nothing but the 
stirring tree-tops and the stars peeping through. 
I made believe that I was in a winged car, float- 
ing along up there. It seemed so real that once 
or twice I clutched Cousin Sally and Kitty, to 
keep from being brushed off by the boughs. This 
made Cousin Sally nervous; she thought that it 
was one of my symptoms, and said she should be 
“ glad and thankful ” to get me home. 

Then, pretty soon, we came to Middle Street. 
Here I had other things to observe. I sat erect 
and observed them. 

There was light stealing through the blinds of 
the Tates* front parlor, and the piano was going ; 
Celia, Henrietta, and Julie must be entertaining 
their beaux. Both of Aunt Priscilla’s blinds were 
partly open ; I knew that she and Liddy Ellen 
were sitting there, watching to see what went on 
in the neighborhood. I could hear the boisterous 
Bibber boys, playing in their yard ; their mother 
let them stay out (so I had heard Aunt Priscilla 
and Liddy Ellen declare) disgracefully late. Cap’n 
Weeks sat at a table near his open window, nod- 
ding over his newspaper, and big, dark, flitting 
things, which I knew must be moths, were hover- 
269 


MY WONDERFUL VISIT 

ing around the lamp-chimney and his bald head. 
Something white was glimmering on the steps of 
the Halladay house ; it must be Anita Berry’s 
dress. How pleased she would be to see Kitty — 
for of course Kitty would run over there and have 
a chat. 

How natural everything looked ! — just as it 
always used to ! — the trees, the lamp-post, the 
houses, our wood-shed with its open door, and the 
cheerful light, far in beyond the entry, where I 
should find them all. In another minute I had 
found them, and was in my mother’s arms. 

“ Oh, mother ! mother! ” I cried ; “ I’ve had 
such a good time! But, oh, I’m so glad to get 
home! ” 


The End 


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